Independent cinema has had a long and storied history, but it cannot be viewed as a single endless stream, but rather a series of chapters, each one defined as something of a generation in a long journey towards negotiating the boundary between the mainstream and the arthouse. One of the most fascinating, at least in terms of the number of talented careers it launched, as well as how it finally allowed many smaller films to get recognition, took place between the late 1980s and early 1990s, which saw the birth of several great films. One of the most heralded is Georgia, in which director Ulu Grossbard (a veteran filmmaker responsible for some terrific films, but who unfortunately rarely receives much acclaim) works with screenwriter Barbara Turner to tell the story of two women, connected by the bond of familial blood and their shared affinity towards music, but separated by wildly different purposes, leading to an extremely celebrated film, having grown a substantial base of support over the years. Unfortunately, this is not going to be yet another opportunity to layer praise on this film, since I found Georgia to be quite a chore, a film that is as confusing as it is overwrought, which is always a sign of a film that is going to struggle to achieve its full potential as a result of being quite unsteady from the start, and never quite launching itself as anything particularly urgent or interesting outside of having a couple of good ideas embedded deep within the film. There are several areas in which this film begins to be derailed, not least the unstable writing and the lacklustre directing, making it clear that the screenplay needed to be co-authored by someone with a more concise understanding of the central themes, and helmed by a younger director with a more fresh and interesting perspective, rather than a grizzled journeyman whose previous work contains some gems, but none of them seeming to be a good precursor to this film, which ultimately leads to a project that offered nothing but the most insincere and uncompromisingly diminishing returns.

For the record, Georgia has some good ideas. It is a film that centres around music, and presents two very different protagonists – one a soft-spoken folk singer who is proud to have built a solid career that has allowed a strong group of supporters, which she did concurrently to raising a family, while the other is a loose-canon punk rock performer whose life is in absolute shambles, and which seems to become only more derailed as the days progress. This, on its own, is a promising concept, so introducing the idea that these two characters are sisters is a good way to tie everything together and evoke a very compelling narrative. Turner was compelled to write a film about sisterhood, basing it around the idea that music is a unifying factor that we all share in some way or another, which has allowed Georgia to take on a secondary life as a story of how music can change the world through simply shifting the perspective of those who require a boost in one direction or the other. We struggle to resist the charming approach the film has to exploring the relationship between these two sisters. There is an alternate reality where this film was written as a more tender comedy, one that leans into the inherent humour of having two very different protagonists who are forced to work together despite their variances in both aesthetic and general demeanour. In fact, the decision to extinguish just about every fragment of humour is the film’s downfall, as by refusing to lean into the naturalistic, touching comedy, it becomes dour and dull, and never quite manages to achieve something of value, which becomes quite a concern when we realize how important the topic at the heart of the story was, or at least was intended to be at first.

All the goodwill this film amasses from its touching story of sisterhood and the power of music is almost immediately undone when it comes time to put these ideas into practice, since the film as a whole is tonally about as uneven as it could be without veering towards being entirely absurd. As mentioned before, this seems to be something that would have worked better as a comedy, or at least employed more humour in the story, since the odd couple scenario has elevated many dismal films and made them undeniably better, which would have easily remedied the clear flaws embedded in this film. Instead, we have a story that is extremely lacking when it comes to nuance – for something promoted as a work of immense humanity, the film is not at all subtle, and it almost assumes that the audience has never encountered a story about troubled people finding solace through the power of music before, which is almost condescending if there wasn’t such a sense of real sincerity that makes us think this film was genuine in its perspective. It’s this very earnestness that proves to be the root of the flaws that define this film – there’s just something deeply unsettling about how willing the film is to go to the dark places within the minds of its protagonist, almost as if it were open to exploiting her and pushing the character to the very edge of her sanity. It’s not pleasant, and it can become extremely uncomfortable, especially since we never feel as if there is some kind of safety net that will prevent the film from succumbing to the darkness that seems to be lingering around every corner. It’s not an encouraging film, and for a story supposedly centred on recovery, it is oddly cynical – even the proposed happy ending is only mildly positive, and we never quite feel like any growth has occurred, which just renders the previous two hours mainly redundant. It’s not interesting enough on its own to earn the benefit of the doubt, and it becomes deeply overwrought, almost to the point of being unbearable.

For a film supposedly showcasing impressive performances from its cast, Georgia is surprisingly flaccid when it comes to actually giving either of its two central characters anything valuable to do. Understandably, this film was a personal project for both Jennifer Jason Leigh and Mare Winningham, so suggesting that they were miscast feels counterintuitive as far as criticism goes. Yet, neither one of them is even vaguely convincing – Winningham is decent as the mild-mannered, grounded one of the two sisters, but when it comes to supposedly being this Joni Mitchell-inspired figure, she consistently falls short, and never comes across as someone who particularly enjoys being on stage. Conversely, Leigh plays a character who is clearly comfortable on stage, to the point where her performance actually veers towards being quite ineffectual and slightly frustrating. Sadie Flood had the potential to be one of the greatest examples of a complex, flawed protagonist, but Leigh was seemingly given the task of playing her in a way that promises layers, but which proves to be entirely one-dimensional and entirely limited. It’s not a good showcase for all she can do – whether its throwing herself around in a series of profanity-laden outbursts, or caterwauling on stage in some of the most painful musical performances ever committed to film (which may have been intentional, but is in no way encouraging or entertaining), and never once does it dare attempt to give the character any nuance, and instead depends on Leigh to play a role that lacks any consistency, and instead seems to be driven by the single purpose of seeing just how far they can push the character before she falls apart. It feels vaguely exploitative, and we never sense that there is any real compassion behind this film.

Georgia is a challenging film to get through, being an overlong and meandering jumble of ideas, and not one that pays off. Instead, we’re confronted with two hours of poorly edited sequences that are not particularly compelling, filled with characters of ambiguous morals, albeit not the kind that makes them interesting, but rather deeply confusing and entirely unconvincing. The performances are lacklustre at best, and the film simply doesn’t know how to use these talented actors, being a mostly dull experience that gives them very little to do. Overall, its nothing valuable, and it feels like it has been overinflated by those seeking a successor to the gritty human dramas of John Cassavetes – this film could have achieved that with a younger, more exciting director at the helm (not to dismiss Grossbard, who did exceptional work – he just seemed like an odd choice for a film about Generation X and their existential ennui), or at least a more coherent set of hands guiding the production in a direction that felt like it was actually aiming to achieve something of value. As a whole, Georgia is not a good film – it’s uneven, morally questionable and sometimes extremely boring. Too much emphasis is given to mediocre musical performances (I understand the reasoning behind having Leigh and Winningham sing live, but neither of them have the stage presence that could sell these characters, nor are they particularly adept at the genres into which they are forced), and not enough to actuallky developing the characters, it just becomes a chore, and not something that earns the time we spend with it – and we foolishly wait to see if it is going to improve, but it never does, spiraling into a conclusion that is unsatisfying and quite frustrating, the perfect description for this film as a whole, especially considering the potential it had at the outset, none of which is ever met at any point throughout these exhausting two hours of pure frustration.