There's Nothing Quiet About A QUIET LITTLE MARRIAGE

An award winning and audience pleasing film on the festival circuit starting with AFI 2008, writer/director Mo Perkins didn't lose any time before snatching a deal that now brings A QUIET LITTLE MARRIAGE to the IFC Channel on the cable circuit around the US.

If you really want some sneaky dysfunction, look no further than A QUIET LITTLE MARRIAGE. My first thoughts after screening this film were that it is connectable, touchable and human as Cy Carter and Mary Elizabeth Ellis, as husband and wife Dax and Olive, draw you into their web of married disappointment, disillusion and, deceit. After screening it yet a second time, those are still my thoughts.

Dax and Olive appear to have it all. Good friends, a happy marriage, a screwed up brother, father with Alzheimer’s. They go along with their day-to-day routine nary saying a word to each other, going through the motions of domestic bliss. But that’s only on the surface because unspoken thoughts and desires loom large, particularly when Olive tells Dax that she wants a baby. Big mistake. The product of a rocky childhood, that’s the last thing he wants. And he was sure he told her that. Or maybe he just thought it. Likewise, Olive was certain she told Dax she wanted a family. Or maybe she just thought she did.

At a silent stalemate, we watch them continue to go through the motions of marriage but with new layers of tacit response. Then one night, thanks to a little too much alcohol, Olive gets inspired into tricking Dax by poking holes in her diaphragm hoping for one of those "oops" pregnancies. But in conversation she makes a remark one day about someone getting pregnant even when using a diaphragm,. Striking fear in Dax, on the QT he starts snooping around and discovers what Olive has done. But, keeping it to himself, he says nothing and instead starts slipping birth control pills into her coffee every morning. With each feeling secure and confident in their own subterfuge, confidence takes hold, their sex life explodes through the roof and then Olive goes to see her ob-gyn.

More than an exquisite acting ensemble, this is an exquisitely charming tacitly textured little gem of a film. Written and directed by Mo Perkins, she calls on her own life experiences and that of her parents and grandparents to bring very real, very human elements to the story. There are touches of her grandfather who was afflicted with Alzheimer’s. Then there is the tacit silent and outward appearance of happiness as she saw in her parents marriage. And finally, she has her own marriage and true love to call on and the potential land mines and questions that need to be faced but are afraid to be thanks to the "baggage" of one's family and past so ingrained in you. Through a technique blending writing and improvision, Perkins and her leads eventually achieve a perfect little marital blend.

As for the acting, if there are any cast members not working in "It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia" please raise your hands. Already comfortable with each other in a small screen ensemble setting, the transition of Mary Elizabeth Ellis, Cy Carter, Jimmi Simpson, Charlie Day and Lucy DeVito to the big screen is a no-brainer. The well established chemistry of each, particularly that of Carter and Ellis, is refreshing and necessary to a story of this nature. For me, the icing on the cake to this little gathering is one of my favorite character actresses, Melanie LynskeyMelanie Lynskey as Olive’s best friend Monique. Pivotal to the storyline, Lynskey’s role is small, necessary and perfectly postured.

Very much guerrilla filmmaking, the film was shot in and around Los Angeles, with everyone calling on friends and friends of friends for use of their apartments, streets, garages, furniture - not to mention help in the production department. Notable is the work of Eric Zimmerman, Director of Photography. Crisp, clean, vivid, time lapse imagery is balanced against the day-in-day-out routine of Dax and Olive with visually compelling result serving in a dichotomous nature that helps carry the story.

There is nothing quiet about A QUIET LITTLE MARRIAGE. Speaking volumes, the loudest message is what will Mo Perkins delight us with next.

Written and Directed by Mo Perkins