Almost a decade after debuting with gay drama The Delta, Ira Sachs returns with this resolutely uninvolving mood-piece. The decision to avoid melodramatics in chronicling a Russian trophy wife’s (Dina Korzun) fling with her musician husband’s son (Darren Burrows) seems shrewd, especially in a Memphis context where every tear and heartache finds its way into a cliché-strewn lyric.
But Sachs deprives the affair of intensity and, consequently, it’s hard to empathise with her plight, even though Rip Torn’s spouse is clearly an egotistical chauvinist. Burrows’ lack of personality doesn’t help, nor does his whiny resentment of his father and indifference towards his newly pregnant wife. But what most deadens this limp drama is Sachs’ arch striving for impressionistic significance.