“Didn’t you see this coming?” says the entirely foreseeable villain of It Cuts Deep, a quirky and macabre comedy about a couple trying (and failing) to get their relationship back on a steady course.
Of course, the underlying problem with everything going on between Sam (Gould) and Ashley (Jackson) is that they’re just heading in completely different directions. Even after all these years, he’s a big goof who jokes about anal, and she wants to have the talk about marriage and kids. The long-suffering frustration is mapped on her face constantly, and heading back to his hometown to spend some time with his folks only digs those lines deeper. First, they have some time alone there – or it would be alone if Sam’s old friend Nolan (Anderson) doesn’t run into them. Did we mention there was a gruesome murder in Sam’s house a few years ago? Well, there was, and it’s no surprise that returning to the scene of that grisly crime is triggering a few bad memories for Sam.
As far as whodunnits go, the reveal is so obvious that you’ll be doubting your first guess – even though it is pretty much likely to be spot on. However, that bit of the puzzle is the least interesting, quickly followed by the why. Instead, the pleasure is in the three-hander as Nolan insinuates his way back into Sam’s life. Meanwhile Sam himself becomes increasingly unhinged about the bad memories coming up, and his increasing conviction that Ashley is falling for Nolan’s boorish charms.
Unfortunately, first-time feature director Santos seems to have decided to have the characters all be in completely different movies. Sam starts off as merely but severely annoying, begging the question why the straitlaced Ashley endures his childishness (she clearly must have found it charming at some point). Over time, he heads into gurning lunacy as he becomes increasingly unhinged. This is clearly a directorial choice, as Anderson reflects both sides, flicking instantaneously from hammier than a Monte Cristo that’s light on turkey to malevolent as a serial killer.
Whether that’s really him or just Sam’s paranoia talking is just one of a trawler’s worth of red herrings that aren’t as slippery as Santos seemingly hopes, so the reveal is actually a relief because it opens up the final act for some vintage, if slightly cartoonish, cat-and-mouse chase. Yet even that’s a weird mesh with the film’s of the grimy, gritty, grainy rural aesthetic that is so in vogue at the moment. The end result is like a Le Théâtre du Grand-Guignol production with all the ghoulish payoff that suggests, just with more wakka-wakka comedy than metaphysical angst.
It Cuts Deep is available on VOD now.
This article appears in November 13 • 2020.
