Find Your Film Recommendation: ‘Lorelei’ (Jena Malone, Pablo Schreiber)

Indie fillms can get lost in the shuffle amidst the crowded streaming and VOD landscape. Find Your Film co-host Eric Holmes and I really dig the new feature Lorelei. Bruce Purkey is not a fan, but in the latest podcast Eric and I discuss what we love about this Jena Malone and Pablo Schreiber headlined feature.

Lorelei centers on Wayland (Pablo Schreiber), a just released convict who spent fifteen years in jail and is trying to get back on track. Wayland’s extended family is a biker gang, and by not snitching on his colleagues during a failed robbery he gained a ton of respect from his crew.

Respect doesn’t pay the bills, however, as he is now trying to make ends after he becomes involved with his high school girlfriend Dolores (Jena Malone) and her three children (Amelia Borgerding, Chancellor Perry, Parker Pascoe-Sheppard).

Dolores’ dreams of heading out to California and seeing the ocean has been dimmed due to the taxing pressures of single motherhood. With Wayland back in the picture, her childhood fairy tale may come true. Wayland shared that dream years ago, but these days he is trying to plant his feet firmly on the ground.

One person is trying to recapture her youth, and the other is trying to carve out a new family with the day to day grind. Ultimately these differing goals come to a head, and with children in the mix, complications are bound to happen.

Written and directed by Sabrina Doyle, Lorelei mixes a fable-like narrative with a blue collar, earthbound perspective. Schreiber and Malone are fantastic as the people who are desperately trying to make things work even when they’re not playing with house money.

Eric Holmes and I absolutely dug the film, and he mentioned that he had a personal resonance with the narrative. I mistakenly thought that Lorelei would be a predictable, been there done that type of story but I was thankfully wrong.

We should have talked a bit more about the awesome performances that each of the kids delivered in the film, and I mistakenly thought Malone’s character was named “Lorelei.” Other than that, our discussion of Lorelei begins at the 37:16 mark.

If you have already seen Lorelei or are planning to check it out, we discuss our different takes on the ending at the final moments of our podcast! That’s an extra treat for Lorelei fans, and I’m hoping a ton of people appreciate this movie as well. Bruce wasn’t on the podcast (he described the movie as “every cliche in the poverty porn book”), and it would have been interesting to gather his full thoughts on the flick.

Lorelei is now out in select theaters and is available On Demand. Tell us what you think of the film!!

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