A joint directing and writing project from superb actors Alan Cumming and Jennifer Jason Leigh. The film has a seemingly improvised, verite feel to it. As it's about a party, it works almost as if it's a home movie and given the feeling of friends in a labor of love project, shaky camerawork and cropped heads at the top of many frames it probably was intended as such. Cumming and Leigh play an estranged show couple attempting to reconcile and celebrate their sixth anniversary. They invite their friends and neighbors (each of whom they judge and are in turn judged by them) and as the evening progresses, devastating secrets are revealed. There's quite a bit of Edward Albee's influence at work--the script seems designed to portray everyone in the most despicable manner possible. But Cumming and Leigh don't spend enough time on background information so that when empathy is called for it's impossible for you to deliver. Still, there's a suitably uncomfortable feeling that permeates the proceedings and the filmmakers and performers are delighted to be in the process of creating something with emotion. It has its moments.
Review of The Anniversary Party
