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The Reluctant Fundamentalist: The timing of the release of The Reluctant Fundamentalist certainly feels relevant in light of recent events in Boston. Changez is a young Pakistani man finding success in the United States. After graduating from Princeton, he gets a job at a prestigious consultancy firm as an analyst and quickly moves up the ranks. That all changes after the attacks of 9/11. As a successful businessman, he escapes the harsh treatment of detention, but he can’t help noticing the increased suspicion that his background brings upon him, and he returns to Pakistan. There he begins to protest U.S. policies non-violently but vehemently, and his outspokenness leads to his becoming a suspected terrorist.

VOD Pick of the Week (also in theaters)

Sun Don’t Shine
The story starts in the middle as Crystal and Leo are involved in a struggle off the side of the road. At first it seems like she is trying to escape from him, but it soon becomes obvious that they are together, bound by some horrible secret. Leo is focused. He has come up with a plan to get them out of the predicament they find themselves in. He concentrates on protocol and schedule, but it is obvious that his attempts at controlling the situation are just a way to avoid facing the fact that things are spiraling out of control. Crystal is irrational and flighty. She speaks of building a house where she and Leo can live together, he with his place out back where he can keep his tools and she with her room upstairs where she stores her decorating supplies. When she speaks, it sounds like a dream, but real life is playing out more like an inescapable nightmare.

It’s difficult to watch Sun Don’t Shine without hearing echoes of Terrence Malick’s Badlands with two young lovers on the run across a desolate landscape, though in this case the northern Midwest is replaced with central Florida. The stifling Florida heat mimics the oppressive tension bearing down on Crystal and Leo, and the sweat drips off them like guilt and impending doom. Stylistic devices such as voiceover dialogue laid over montage images add to the Malickian feel.

We learn what has happened in bits and pieces. We discover that Crystal has a daughter and a husband and that she has a history of being in abusive relationships, which helps explain her behavior. Leo sees himself as her protector, albeit a dysfunctional one, and he is trying to set up an alibi for the couple. The film is less about what happens than it is about presenting an atmosphere and characters. As the film progresses, Crystal’s actions beg the question of whether she is actually the femme fatale in this neo-noir. She seems perpetually to be in a partial dream state, and her self-destructive behavior leads the couple towards their inevitable downfall that Leo is not bright enough to avoid no matter how much planning and scheming he does.

Sun Don’t Shine marks actress Amy Seimetz’s directorial debut and it does make sense that this film was directed by a woman and an actress. The noir genre gets new life coming from a female point of view, and as a director she allows for her actors (Kate Lyn Sheil and Kentucker Audley) to dig deep into their characters even if she doesn’t always make their motivations overtly known. It is an impressive debut that ends with a well earned ambiguity.

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