Spring movie review & film summary (2015)
"Spring" is arguably a character study since Louise's transformation from mystery fling to serious partner marks Evan's greatest metamorphosis. And that's ok. The film's main strength is its zen-like calm, an atmosphere of non-judgmental acceptance that gets thrown out of whack once Louise's secrets are revealed. We follow Evan as he blithely—though partly out of shock—flees first to tourist-y Rome, then picturesque Puglia. He dithers around with some obnoxious—but sympathetic—British dude-bros. Then he takes a live-in job working with eccentric farmer Angelo (Francesco Carnelutti), who serves as Angelo's grandfatherly moral compass. Then Evan stumbles into Louise, and "Spring" starts to drift into darker territory.
Louise and Evan's relationship is the real reason you should see "Spring." Their respective quirks make them natural foils: he's a slightly-uptight, definitely-naive angry young man, and she's a disarmingly outspoken, but ultimately stand-offish femme fatale. Both characters consciously resist their respective limitations, which makes for great, naturalistic conversations. Take for example their first meeting: Evan blusters his way through this awkward encounter, asking Louise if she only wants to have sex with him because she's a prostitute. It's a suspicion that's mirrored later in the film when an obnoxious American tourist assumes he can pay Louise for sex. Evan's not just like this boorish fellow ex-patriate, but he also kind of is. The fact that Evan can't help himself from (repeatedly) joking that Louise may be a lady of the night—what an introduction!—says a lot about "Spring." It's a film about seeing a character undergo radical growth that isn't necessarily progress, and about the evolution of a relationship whose logical conclusion isn't particularly logical or conclusive.
At the same time, the film's lighter-than-air charms dissipate whenever the film's creators treat Louise like a girl-shaped mystery box. Writer Justin Benson and co-director Aaron Moorehead treat scenes where Louise futzes with a mysterious syringe with gravity. But they delight in disorienting viewers with camera effects, and brief, elliptically-edited sequences that tease viewers with information about Louise's affliction. These scenes are supposed to feel like pockets of memory that dissipate after they rise to the film's surface. To that end, Benson and Moorehead succeed. But the deliberately vague nature of these scenes becomes upsetting once Louise is forced to explain to Evan what's wrong with her, thereby putting her skittishly vamp-y behavior into perspective.
