Rated: NR    Runtime: 106 mins.
Directed by:Ronald Bronstein
Written by: Ronald Bronstein
Starring: Dore Man, David Sandholm, Paul Grant, Carmine Marino, Mary Wall, Paul Grimstad
U S A
Language: English

A self-described “troll from under the bridge,” the painfully awkward and psychologically unstable Keith Sontag (Dore Mann) spends his days selling coupons door-to-door and his evenings trapped in a squalid apartment situated in some particularly hellish outer ring of New York. With the most basic elements of human communication a struggle, Sontag lurches through an uncaring city, attempting to aid a suicidal friend, evict an unctuous roommate, and simply attain some measure of self-respect.

With Frownland, Bronstein (nominated for the Independent Spirit’s Someone to Watch Award) has made a bold and bracing film that is both a hilarious black comedy and a ragged love letter to an earlier unpasteurized era of independent film. Winner of the Gotham Award for Best Film Not Playing at a Theatre Near You and one of indieWIRE’s top undistributed films of 2007.

"Frownland is a jagged little pill of a movie, in turns scary and strayed, honest and threatening, funny, frustrating and frazzled. A crummy window into a world where not just its creators but everyone feels rootless and displaced.

More succinctly, Frownland is my own small contribution to the sinking barge of the 16mm indie model; both an overripe tomato lobbed with spazmo inaccuracy at the spotless surface of the silver screen and a mad valentine to the craggy tradition of unadulterated cheap-o-independent expression. Its inelegance is its spirit. I hope you dig it." —Ron Bronstein

Forms: Narrative Fiction, Feature
Genres: Alternative, Comedy, Drama, Underground, B-movie, Deconstruction, Independent, Art
Niches: Mature/Adult

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