NOTHING REALLY HAPPENS: Surrealist Comedy Does Go Places

What exactly happens in Justin Petty’s suburban nightmare, perhaps a genuine nightmare, or a vigorous dose of LSD? Hallucinations are quite common in movies, and, excluding myself, some people may relish such specious encounters as well. Nothing Really Happens is a sci-fi comedy which doesn’t seem to go anywhere, but every movie goes somewhere. In Nothing Really Happens, things do happen: characters have personal encounters, stakes are clearly drawn and there’s sensibility in the endless haze of perplexity.

Dave Stimple (Adam Edwards) is a mattress store owner, keeping the family business alive and well. He’s also a married man, living a very suburban and very boring life. To make matters worse, Dave surrounds himself with people who are rather brash and insufferable. His wife, Jess (Lindsay Gustin), is kind of stubborn and overly fragile, and Dave’s opinion doesn’t really matter. When Dave complains about the toilet paper, calling it “abrasive”, his wife responds via text, “You wipe aggressively. This isn’t a new problem.” His next-door neighbor Randy (Bobby Dornbos) is fixated on the piles of shit (topped with tiny French flags, yes, you heard that right) that keep appearing on his sidewalk, to the point of calling Dave over to investigate. Dave believes it to be deer shit, but Randy is still unsure. But Randy, being the weirdly blunt person he is, blatantly says to Dave, “You’re a difficult person to connect to,” and then the conversation ends by Randy vehemently telling Dave to get out of here.

Things only get worse for Dave as Miguel (Sami Ismail), a clueless employee at Stimple’s Mattress Temple, informs Dave of the store’s closure. Apparently, the Health Department closed Dave’s store because the beds were riddled with bed bugs. Confused how this could be, Dave meets up with his best bud, Carl (Joseph Graham), at a restaurant to hopefully assuage the weird day he’s been having. Unfortunately, Dave is met with more discomfiture. Carl is skeptical and a strong admirer of metaphysics, and like Randy, Carl insults Dave: “You have a very strange face–very allusive features. Did it ever occur to you that people may avoid you because of it?” Dave leaves the restaurant, but the day only gets weirder.

Hallucinations and bizarre conversations that unfold a bit disjointedly, continue to plague his reality. And surreal hallucinations steer the entirety of the first half, and that can be disorienting. But if you’re able to endure the sensory overload, there is a story, and there is a purpose.

For The Love Of Surreal Cinema, Stick With It

Nothing Really Happens opens to a quaint TV commercial of Stimple Mattress Temple, a mattress store we would soon learn is now being run by Dave. It’s a family business, and the commercial featured Dave’s father. All of a sudden, Dave is seen dressing for work, causing himself to bleed with abrasive toilet paper and saying goodbye to his wife. With only a few scenes, you do get a sense of every character. Jess is impossible-to-please and quite sensitive. Randy is easily annoyed and tells it as it is, while Carl is a metaphysics enthusiast too suspicious for his own good. But it’s hard to tell if the various discussions Dave has with Jess, Randy and Carl are actually occurring.

Dave’s reality is disrupted by static-like sounds and malfunctions. Most exchanges with friends, everyday people and even his wife seem synthetic. Sometimes, some of the words spoken by the people Dave converses with are repeated, much like a scratched record playing the same sound over and over again until it hopefully fixes itself. So the question of whether something is reality or hallucination is always a useful tool you keep by your side as a viewer — but that’s only if you wield any patience. It’s hard to stick with it, especially when every character Dave encounters is somebody incredibly pesky as they are incredibly peculiar.

Petty does construct the film in two parts, with the first part setting up the second. In doing so, the first part is like sensory hokum, a daydream in which the main character has no control over. It’s like the people Dave comes in contact with are solely meant to persuade him that he needs help connecting with other people. Carl, for example, strangely says “Everything is about relationships. You lack empathy, David,” before storming off. Other times, David is judged by his lifestyle choices. A gas station employee, for instance, condemns Dave on his decision to take up smoking: “Smokers by nature are assholes. I find it hard to believe you would actively choose to be a piece of shit.” The dialogue is most definitely frank and unfiltered, helping perpetuate Petty’s vision in the long run.

The first part is hard to weather, chiefly because it seems like Dave’s suburban nightmare, is just that, a nightmare that has no underlying motive other than to mess with the person who it’s intended for, which is Dave. To be fair, it’s one hell of a nightmare. If I had to undergo the kind of stuff Dave has to undergo, I would literally go insane (his ability to withstand this eternal dose of uncalled scrutiny is somewhat admirable). Dave is a passive character, unable to take control of a situation or make his voice heard, so he’s not the most interesting lead character, but that’s also the point. And a solid performance from Adam Edwards does emulate the awkwardness and confoundment of the character’s life at the moment. For Dave, everything is going downhill or things are slightly out-of-place, so he doesn’t know how to react, and that’s exactly what Edwards achieves.

It’s the second part that reveals a sense of direction and renders the first part more comprehensible. Without spoiling too much about the coherency that does eventually betide, this is a story about control and manipulation. It’s also about how the desire to help somebody can be well-intentioned and all, but maybe their actions turn out to be unexpectedly detrimental, or maybe too fabricated or intricate to even sustain some sort of empathy. The person you’re trying to help cannot be reduced to a science experiment; you need empathy and you need to understand what they’re feeling (or at least try to comprehend).

“We all communicate. We just– we just do it differently.”

So if you’re quiet or refuse to interact/respond in the casual fashion, you must be insecure, anti-social or have nothing to say? No, of course not. We have our own innate traits and personal hobbies we hold dear. We can also respond differently to tragedy, grief, euphoria, social interaction and romance, and that’s perfectly okay. With Nothing Really Happens, Petty utilizes Dave to sketch this universal verity.

Although the discourse of individuality is weighty, I can’t say the film inherits a strong emotional core, but that’s not entirely troubling. In regard to comedy, the plain-spoken dialogue — infused with filth and unbridled honesty — is quite funny. In terms of surrealism, the unearthly imagery and raucous sounds do the trick. And the small cast delivers stellar performances — particularly Joseph Graham, whose physicality and charisma, really amplifies the enigmatic presence of Carl. Carl is a layered character, exposed to curiosity and belief, and Graham portrays him impeccably.

Like people, Nothing Really Happens is different. The way it communicates the dangers of somebody’s involvement in another person’s life is dealt with innovatively. Cinema not only communicates moving images and visuals, but it communicates ideas. Although nothing here is stirring or earth-shattering, the technique is there. Whether it be the swift camerawork (close-up shots of Dave’s expressionless face speak volumes for the character’s bewilderment), expeditious editing or piercing sound design, the technical maneuvers ensnare you in Dave’s reality.

Nothing Really Happens…Until It Does

Writer-director Justin Petty has formulated a surrealist comedy, which involves a lot of nightmarish imagery and brimming uncertainty that makes you think of a David Lynch movie. The paranoia and confusion are at large during the first part of Nothing Really Happens, making you believe this is going nowhere…until it does.

The second part manifests a story that’s upheld by a small and talented cast. The story itself is artfully explored by a director and writer who acknowledges the way we judge and help others — and he accomplishes this by guiding us through a mystifying portrait of mind-bending imagination, but utilizing its pithy nature to probe human behavior. When you have nothing to do, Nothing Really Happens will give you plenty to do.

What is your favorite sci-fi comedy? What is your favorite surrealist movie? Let us know in the comments!

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