A sudden loss forces an outsider to rethink his priorities in Family Obligations, a well-meaning but flawed drama now streaming after festival screenings. Written and directed by Kenneth R. Frank, the movie doesn’t always overcome its bare-bones budget and technical insufficiencies. But characters and settings like this don’t often reach the screen, at least not presented with this much compassion.
Peter Steele (Chris Mollica) is so obsessed with his job that he has to be reminded to make eye contact with coworkers. Long estranged from his father, Peter doesn’t know how to respond when he dies while driving drunk. Peter inherits the suburban Long Island house he left years earlier. He then finds out he’s responsible for his uncle Frank (Frank Failla), who’s suffering from terminal leukemia.
It’s a tough adjustment for someone who has been trying to live completely on his own. On top of that, Frank is difficult, belligerent, even hostile. During a visit to Frank’s doctor, Peter learns that his uncle won’t take his medication, adjust his diet, or do anything to help himself. He has perhaps a year to live.
Peter runs into Frank’s neighbor Melanie (Chandler Rosenthal). A single mother raising seven-year-old Mia (Eleanor Brandle-Frank), Melanie is so helpful and outgoing that Peter is soon dropping by her apartment for advice. Will they be able to develop a viable relationship? Will Peter learn to trust others?
As a writer, Frank relies on time-worn devices to jump-start his characters’ stories. The death of Peter’s father, for example, as well as his uncle’s looming demise, are classic narrative events that force change. The husband who abandoned Melanie is an obvious device as well. To the writer and director’s credit, Family Obligations tries to deal honestly, realistically, with these events instead of blowing them up into emotional hurricanes.
In fact, the best aspect of the movie is its even-handed approach to characters who could easily be milked for melodrama. Despite his crude bluster, Frank takes a reasonable enough approach to his sickness. And Melanie’s attitude toward her absent husband is more nuanced than viewers might expect.
The downside to that approach is that these characters and their lives, their homes, are not especially interesting — at least not in Frank’s treatment of them. Viewers need more than surface details and bullet points from a screenwriting course to care about what they are watching. On top of the thin script, Family Obligations‘ production values are so limited that the film’s success or failure lies entirely on its performers.
Chandler Rosenthal is extremely winning as Melanie. She plays the character as funny, self-aware, kind, but also astute enough to see when people are not being honest with her. It’s a warm, open performance without affectation. As a screenwriter, Frank gives her a handful of revealing scenes that flesh her out as a real person, not a stereotype. (And as cinematographer, Frank frames her work adroitly.) But it’s Rosenthal who turns that material into something special.
Frank Failla is less accomplished as the terminally ill uncle, pushing a blue-collar accent and offering swagger instead of insight. Chris Mollica’s Peter is the weak link among the cast. Opening scenes suggest he might be on an Asperger’s spectrum, but his supposed eye-contact issues vanish as the movie progresses. What’s left is his perpetual scowl, an expression that closes his character off from everyone else in the movie.
Family Obligations takes easy turns as the characters resolve their issues. Worse, the movie’s technical problems emphasize the script’s drawbacks. Continuity is awkward. Shots aren’t always focused. The sound is a problem throughout. Dialogue is mixed poorly, ambient noises are too intrusive, and some material isn’t synched properly. Add a morose, pretentious soundtrack by Benjamin Morse, and Family Obligations can be a real chore to sit through at times.
It’s a shame, because the movie develops a real sense of community. Many of the filmmakers here have worked together before, and it shows in the easy chemistry among the performers. Viewers at regional festivals in the Northeast have responded favorably, and why not? Family Obligations is a sensitive attempt to look at people who persevere despite their thwarted dreams.
Available on Amazon Prime Video.
