Red Rocket ★★★½
SEAN Baker is an amazing film-maker.
He has only made a handful of films since 2000 but it’s his approach that has endeared him to critics.
Baker’s films look and feel different, using bare locations, shooting quickly and with many non-actors.
The results, such as 2015’s Tangerine and The Florida Project (2017), are authentic and idiosyncratic stories about real people.
His latest, Red Rocket from 2021, was shot in small-town Texas by a crew of 10 in just over a month with many locals filling speaking roles.
Of course the three main characters are played by professionals and it’s also here that Baker has made some wonderful choices.
Simon Rex is a revelation as Mike Davies, aka Mikey Saber, who returns to his home town after making a name for himself as a performer in pornographic films.
His return after 17 years isn’t welcomed by Lexi, the wife he left behind, and her mother Lil who believe Mikey is still an untrustworthy and lazy conman at heart.
But Mikey slowly weasels his way back into their favour and, albeit he is selling drugs for a living, shows some signs that he may have turned a corner.
All this changes again when he meets a 17-year-old waitress, Strawberry, played beautifully by Suzanna Son.
Is Mikey truly smitten by the free-spirited Strawberry or does he just see her as his entry back into the porn business?
The beauty of how all the characters are written is the mixed feelings they create in the audience, epitomised in Mikey.
There is no doubt he can be seen as a reprehensible character – a drug dealer who abandoned his wife to make money having sex with other women and is now trying to exploit a teenager.
But Baker’s presentation and the performances of Rex and Son, show the relationship and our views of Mikey in a fluid way that makes the film such as enriching and entertaining experience.
It’s also very humorous and full of quirky characters who help ensure you’re never sure what’s coming next.
Make sure you see it and then go back and watch The Florida Project which is even better.