Starlet out of Tangerine meets The Florida Project in RED ROCKET, the audacious new film from writer director Sean Baker.
Simon Rex stars as the hyper kinetic pensioned off porn star, Mikey Saber, who returns to his hometown in coastal Texas seeking solace and succour from his abandoned spouse, Lexi.
She, along with her mother, are shy of having him shack up in their humble abode, but his hustling charm dilutes their disdain. They could sure use the cash injection of rent money he promises, and Lexi could sure use the root.
Mikey’s a shit, a shining chrome plated turd, but he’s charismatic, a chancer who jackknifes others’ better judgement. To give him his due, he does initially try to seek legitimate gainful employment, but his past history as an adult entertainment performer works as an impediment and he ends up dealing weed to local oil refinery workers through the auspices of a gangland matriarch.
Regardless of his rekindled relationship with Lexi, Mikey becomes smitten by sixteen year old Strawberry, a donut shop assistant who he woos with the intention of grooming her for adult film production, his passport back to prominence in the porn industry.
RED ROCKET is a superb study in how the appalling can be appealing and the character of Mikey is the epitome and personification of how swindlers succeed, not only with suckers but with the astute, the cynical and the naive.
Simon Rex is a revelation as the motor mouth grifter, Mikey, snake charmer and snake all in one, a rascal larrikin both loathsome and likable.
Bree Elrod as Lexi and Brenda Deiss as her mother, Lil, are equally mesmeric, as is Suzanna Son as Strawberry, and Shih-Ching Tsou as her Donut Shop boss.
Indeed, it is the women in RED ROCKET who, although seduced and beguiled by Mikey, do not ultimately succumb or surrender to his manipulations. Their strengths amplify his inherent weakness.
A surprising, provocative, comedy of errors and appalling behaviours, RED ROCKET is the first best film of the year, giving comedic credence to the adage, to err is human, to forgive, divine.
Richard Cotter