I call those films that start by drifting in on a particular character, follow them for a while, and along the way we get an insight, motivation, sometimes joy or sadness, and, slowly drifting out again, leaving us sometimes with unanswered questions, food for thought, and most importantly, revelations or reflections of our own lives.
In “Multiple Sarcasms”, we drift into the life of Gabriel (Timothy Hutton). His life, from the outside, seems to be going the way we all want our lives to progress. He’s a successful architect, married his college sweetheart Annie (Dana Delany), and has a daughter named Elizabeth (India Ennenga) who’s just bit precocious but normal. Gabriel isn’t unhappy with his life so far; he just has that feeling that something is missing at this point. There’s no one reason for him to feel unhappy or unsettled as we get glimpses of what it might be as he spends time with some of his long time friends.
Those friends include his best friend Cari (Mira Sorvino), and yes it is a plutonic relationship that a lot of us men have with female friends, there’s Rocky (Mario Van Peebles) a long time gay friend and no, there’s no relationship, and Pamela (Stockard Channing) the long time literary agent friend who takes on representing Gabriel when he decides a change of direction is needed in his life. The change; he leaves his job to write a play, about his life!
The element that makes “Multiple Sarcasms” a ‘slice of life’ for us as viewers is that writer/director Brooks Branch sets the story in 1979, in our past, as well as his, which prompts us to those same examinations of our lives. It’s always a rewarding element to have the opportunity to talk with the filmmaker!
Stan: How long did it take to bring “Multiple Sarcasms” to the big screen, we both know its not an ‘overnight success process’…
Brooks: I wrote the script over a decade ago I have to say. It sat for a while, and then I came back to it about three years ago or so. The climate had changed, and I think I had more maturity in my own life and looked at it differently, rewrote it with a better understanding of what to do with it at that point!
Stan: That’s a key aspect we learned in film school, write your draft, sleep on it, come back to it, and that sleep could be a day, a month, or a year!
Brooks: So true, its all part of the process!
“Multiple Sarcasms”, starring Timothy Hutton, Mira Sorvino, Dana Delany, Mario Van Peebles, India Ennenga, Laila Robins, and Stockard Channing.
Directed by Brooks Branch, Written by Brooks Branch and Linda Morris. Multiple Avenue Releasing release. Rated R for sexual references and language. Runtime: 97 minutes.
To view the trailer! ~ For a theater near you!
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