deadCENTER review: “The Four-Faced Liar”
“The Four-Faced Liar”
Directed by Jacob Chase
Traditional relationships get the run-around in “The Four-Faced Liar”, the product of a bunch of NYU film students’ work, adapted from a play to film.
The premise is simple enough. Prudish Greg (Daniel Carlisle) moves to New York to be with his just-as-prudish girlfriend Molly (Emily Peck) when they meet new friends Trip (Todd Kubrack), his girlfriend Chlose (Liz Osborn) and his lesbian roommate, Bridget (screenwriter Marja Lewis Ryan). The ensemble grows to become friends, crassly discussing the nature of their relationships over video games (the guys), in the kitchen (the girls) and while playing drinking games (all of them).
Molly—a Clare Danes look-alike—reads Wuthering Heights throughout the film, discussing her dull but practical relationship with Bridget, who listens the way she wishes Greg (read: Linton) would. It soon becomes clear that the two works share a central theme, though—in a twist—Bridget proves Molly’s Heathcliff.
It seems Molly’s grown tired of Greg’s turn-the-lights-off and climb in bed ways, and after a dirty bathroom rendezvous at the crew’s favorite bar, The Four-Faced Liar, the Molly and Bridget sneak around town, pawing at each other like teenagers. It’s not long before roommate Trip finds out and blabs to Greg, which forces Molly into the quintessential Wuthering Heights-situation, whether to choose between what’s socially acceptable and practical or what’s truly her identity.
The film’s not funny enough when it means to be and the characters -privileged twentysomethings- don’t do a whole lot to endear themselves to the audience with their crude and sarcastic treatment of one other. By the story’s end, we’re supposed to somehow feel for the seemingly-hapless Molly who’s extremely immature in her relationship with Bridget and woefully unhappy with the uninspired Greg. It’s difficult to care about a film’s conclusion when none of the characters really seem to care about each other.
Grade: 2 out of 4 stars
–Carney
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