Lockjaw

Sabrina Greco's directorial debut **LOCKJAW** is a comedy about the need to be understood, revolving entirely around the one person who cannot be fully understood. In **LOCKJAW**, Greco's central character — Rayna (played by Blu Hunt) — returns with her friends for another night out on the town after suffering a drunken injury six weeks earlier that has resulted in her jaw being wired shut. As Rayna cavorts around the bars and clubs of the city with her ambiguous relationship with (boyfriend?) Mitch (Colin Burgess) and their third wheel, Noah (Nick Grossman), her interactions become increasingly cringeworthy. From one embarrassing moment to the next, Rayna seems determined to re-enter the same social environment — and embrace the same vices — that led to her injury in the first place. As a character, Rayna is a challenge for viewers, as she displays little awareness of having learned her lesson or of how poorly she reads the people around her. Not for nothing is the film aptly titled **LOCKJAW**, as Rayna and others in her orbit appear "locked" in their own worlds, unable or socially unwilling to communicate what they want or need. This is especially true of Mitch and Rayna's relationship, where neither seems entirely capable of articulating exactly what the other means to them. As the trio descend upon another bar to take in the show of Robert the Mentalist (hilariously executed by Nick Corirossi) — a self-described magician who claims to know what everyone is actually thinking — Greco takes the film's central conceit to its funniest extreme. In a room filled with people incapable of understanding one another, Robert improbably appears to understand Rayna better than anyone else, and proceeds to prove it with increasing awkwardness. I kept thinking that the inverse of Rayna's character was Mike Leigh's Poppy (Sally Hawkins) from his 2008 film **HAPPY-GO-LUCKY** — two central characters at opposite ends of the spectrum: one (Poppy) careening through life with an indestructible openness, the other (Rayna) impulsively sabotaging her social interactions through insecurity and embarrassment. Two sides of the same coin. And yet Hunt's performance as Rayna is incredibly expressive, delivered through gritted teeth (literally) and requiring her to rely far more upon physicality than dialogue. Hunt's facial expressions deftly carry the depth of Rayna's loneliness, social confusion and awkward interactions with aplomb. Ironically, in a film preoccupied with characters who cannot adequately express themselves, the character least capable of speaking becomes its most expressive. **LOCKJAW** is ultimately a film about communication, showcasing what happens when people cannot understand one another — whether deprived of speech, paralyzed by social insecurity or simply unwilling to say what they mean. Rayna may spend the film desperately trying to be understood, but Greco's cleverest observation is that having your mouth wired shut isn't the only way to find yourself incapable of communicating. By the end, Rayna's broken jaw almost seems like the least of her problems.