Twin Falls Idaho (1999)

Awe-inspiring.
Twin Falls Idaho (Michael Polish, 1999)

Sometimes after I see a film, I want to run out and tell the world about how great it is. Other times, I just have to sit there, with no muscle control or brain function, and wait for the movie to sink in. As the closing scenes of Twin Falls Idaho played out before me, I sat, drooling on myself a little, and just stared.

It's that good.

Blake and Francis Falls (Michael and Mark Polish of Hellraiser: Bloodline) are siamese twins who live in a fleabag hotel. For their birthday, they call an escort service; Penny (The Sheld's Michele Hicks in her film debut) arrives. At first disturbed by their condition, she eventually comes to like them, and convinces them to venture outside their shell. The rest of the world, however, are not quite as understanding as Penny.

Mark and Michael Polish are just brilliant in their roles, and they're backed up by a stable of exceptionally talented actors (Lesley Ann Warren, William Katt, Garrett Morris, Jon Gries, and Sasha Alexander, among many others, show up in roles of varying sizes). The acting talent alone would make it work as an odd, avant-garde stage play. What makes it work as a film is Michael Polish's vision-- not only his sympathy for the subject matter, which can be taken as a given, but his way of presenting it. Polish wanders off into little symbolic, almost magic-realist scenes every once in a while to complement the subtle symbolism contained in the rest of the film, but he never overdoes it; a couple of the scenes get perilously close to cheesily sentimental, but never quite cross the line. (This, though, is the most heavily-debated opinion about the movie, specifically in relation to the bicycle scene-- if you liked that, then you're probably going to love the movie.)

At its heart, though, it's another movie about a love triangle, albeit one with an interesting and original twist, and one that's presented just shy of perfectly. A fantastic film. **** ½

I was not expecting this !!!
I would not exactly call myself a softy, but this movie touched just about every emotion possible.

I consider myself a typical guy, and therefore stopped while channel surfing late one night to check out 'Penny'. After a few minutes I brought on the info. on the movie and thought I would check out a little more since the description indicated that the 'hooker' was going to seduce the twins. Ok, what the hell, I'll hang around a bit just to see some skin... Penny is pretty hot.

But within ten minutes I was captured by both the performance of the characters and the writing. Absolutely not the 'run of the mill' kinda of movie. This was so much more than the 'sleaze' I was expecting. This movie is so thought provoking and emotional that I literally had tears in my eyes by the end of the movie. Boy, am I'm glad my girlfriend was not around. Then again, maybe that would have been a GOOD thing.

Anyway, after the movie ended I felt ashamed about what I was expecting, that is after I blew my nose. This was way more of an intimate EXPERIENCE. It'll stick with you for a while.

I was not expecting this !!!
I would not exactly call myself a softy, but this movie touched just about every emotion possible.

I consider myself a typical guy, and therefore stopped while channel surfing late one night to check out 'Penny'. After a few minutes I brought on the info. on the movie and thought I would check out a little more since the description indicated that the 'hooker' was going to seduce the twins. Ok, what the hell, I'll hang around a bit just to see some skin... Penny is pretty hot.

But within ten minutes I was captured by both the performance of the characters and the writing. Absolutely not the 'run of the mill' kinda of movie. This was so much more than the 'sleaze' I was expecting. This movie is so thought provoking and emotional that I literally had tears in my eyes by the end of the movie. Boy, am I'm glad my girlfriend was not around. Then again, maybe that would have been a GOOD thing.

Anyway, after the movie ended I felt ashamed about what I was expecting, that is after I blew my nose. This was way more of an intimate EXPERIENCE. It'll stick with you for a while.