Losing in Love (Review)

Losing in Love is one of those rare gems I would never have watched had it not been recommended to me. And I am immensely grateful to have seen it.

Losing in Love (2016)

Ronnie (Martin Papazian) is a screenwriter who can't seem to catch a break, either in the entertainment industry or just life in general. The movie gives us just enough information to ascertain that Ronnie continues to end up in jail for reasons that are intelligently left unstated (at least directly), and that, at one time, he had been married before the union had ended in divorce. The movie begins as he's released from his most recent stint in jail. He returns to the widow Nanna, played by the wonderful Conni Marie Brazelton of ER fame, who has been allowing him to board in the upstairs loft of her home for a while now. Desperate for work, Ronnie takes a job ghostwriting a script that is supposed to be a love story that the producers want redeveloped to incorporate science-fiction overtones. To make ends meet, he also works as a nightwatchman at a local facility housing mentally disturbed patients. During the day, though, he begins to frequent a local diner where he tries to develop ideas for the script. It is here at this diner that he meets a spunky waitress named Amber (Marina Benedict).

He falls hard for her. And, of course, he begins working out his emotions in his script. Papazian, who writes, directs, and stars as Ronnie, has a wildly imaginative streak that sees him communicate Ronnie's thoughts to the audience either by voiceover monologue that is actually parts of the script he's working on, or by having other, random characters in the film's world say the words onscreen. It's a little jarring at first, to suddenly have these random characters interject exactly how Ronnie is feeling, but the technique is incredibly effective at showing just how closed off Ronnie is to the world at large, how deeply he has receded into himself. It's telling that he doesn't really interact with these characters, but when he exchanges glances with them and they start putting his emotions to words, it articulates that heightened sense of fear that so many closed off people have—the fear of being found out, of being seen through, despite the walls they've built.

Amber finds herself in similar circumstances. At the beginning of the film, she is romantically involved with a nameless man who quickly leaves her high and dry. Suddenly finding herself with no place to go, Ronnie invites her to stay with him at Nanna's place. It is at this point that Losing in Love sets itself apart from the pack of movies in this genre. Whereas most films would, I imagine, build the relationship between Ronnie and Amber in such a way that it culminates in a night of heated passion, Losing in Love has more on its mind than soft porn. There is a noticeable lack of skin in this film. Noticeable only because we have been so inundated by what the Red Hot Chili Peppers call "Californication."

Instead, the film is more concerned with exploring wounds. Literal and figurative. Ronnie's are bound up on the inside. Amber's are, too, but she bears these very distinct scars on her arm. Her wounds are a little more pronounced, but she's not eager to talk about them. Both of them are wounded, both are accustomed to "losing in love," as it were. And this is not necessarily the fault of those with whom they have chosen to associate. They are complex individuals who have walled themselves off from the world as a survival mechanism, a way of coping with their wounds. This, of course, ensures that both Ronnie and Amber are lonely individuals. And in their lonely states, they find each other.

Ronnie is immediately taken with her, but he is hesitant. It takes Amber a while before she comes around to thinking of him as anything more than a patron of the diner. But when she does, the attraction between them becomes that much more pronounced, and the relationship becomes that much more complicated. These are two people learning to live again, fumbling their way through all the awkwardness and knotty textures of forging new relationships.

I think what struck me most about how the characters are written is just how good they are. Ronnie and Amber are both incredibly broken, incredibly wounded individuals who have experienced deaths to feeling. And now the sensations they are experiencing anew threaten the small worlds they've created for themselves. It's dangerous, it's intoxicating, and they both navigate the terrain as well as you might expect them to, given their respective circumstances and dispositions. Sure, they have their problems, as we all do. But what that brokenness has developed in them both is a strong sense of selflessness, and this is ultimately what saves them.

There is a moment in the film in which Amber reveals to Ronnie that she is likely pregnant, the result of her being with the nameless man from the film's beginning. Ronnie, confused, lashes out in anger. The scene really startled me, which I think is exactly the point. Not because of the pregnancy reveal, but because of how both characters respond to one another. Ronnie and Amber are not in a relationship at this point. They're roommates, that's all. But all the underlying tension, the emotions tumbling just beneath the surface, comes blasting out of Ronnie with such ferocity that you're somewhat taken aback. You've gone the entirety of the movie up to this point coming to understand Ronnie as a broken but caring person, and in the briefest of moments you suddenly see just how he ends up in jail, that momentary disregard of self-control that is unsettling to see. But he catches himself almost as quickly as he lashes out, dials it back again, and apologizes. It is a genuinely stunning moment in a film full of stunning moments, the way he suddenly recognizes his own pride in making the situation about him and his emotions, when it is a situation that fundamentally has absolutely nothing to do with him. When discussing this scene with the friend who recommended the film to me, she noted, "While certainly Ronnie is showing his genuine feelings for her with his inadvertent jealousy, he hasn't earned the right to that jealousy because he hasn't spoken [his feelings for Amber], so it becomes a kind of selfishness." I couldn't agree more. You really can see the shades of complexity to his character.

For Amber, the complexity arises when she realizes she actually likes Ronnie, when she begins to let him see the chinks in her armor. She pulls away, calls it quits, says it's time to go. And Ronnie—selflessly, it seems—lets her walk away. He tells himself that this is what love is, which, on one level, sounds pretty righteous. Until he comes to realize that this is just another justification, another way of not dealing with his emotions. Ironically, the relationships Ronnie forges with the mental patients when he works the nightshift become the most pivotal in getting him to rethink his situation. Time and again he crosses paths with the seemingly unhinged Teddy (played to perfection by Ronnie Gene Blevins) and a girl named Joey (Claudia Doumit). His interactions with both characters and their slightly skewed visions of the world get him outside of himself long enough to recognize his mistake, and really highlight the importance of friendship and speaking plainly about complicated matters. In a way, these interactions are the pivot points upon which the story beats turn, each conversation making Ronnie a little more introspective and aware. He realizes that he has let Amber go without ever truly expressing himself in any other form than what's written in his script. So he resolves to alter the ending. Of both his script, and of his relationship with Amber.

I found shades of myself in both characters. When Ronnie first becomes interested in Amber, he battles within himself. Is it love, or is it just loneliness driving him to latch onto the first new attachment to come his way? I find myself asking that question a lot, if only because I've had to have a few hard, honest conversations with myself in which I've come to realize that so many of my attachments have formed out of loneliness, a desire to be heard and understood on some fundamental level. It's never a good way to form relationships, of course. It's inherently self-centered, and turns the other individual into a need-meeter, rather than allowing them their own dignity and power of determination. And when things begin to get complicated, Amber severs the ties and walks away at the expense of herself. Boy, do I understand this. It's my default reaction in most any relationship that grows beyond simplicity. Sometimes, I think, it's justified. Necessary, even, when the relationship is a bad one to begin with. Other times...well, spin it however you want, it's just a selfish thing to do. I just find it hard to fault her for her decision, though. Numerous decisions to walk away from a number of relationships has brought a lot of unnecessary hurt and pain, but it's also kept me alive. I have a friend who says that childhood is a condition from which we must all eventually recover. And the recovery process, I think, breeds in us all these little tendencies that allow our survival mechanisms to show, mechanisms that come out in the decisions we make. It's funny how the decisions that keep us on life support can turn around and cut our throats when we least expect it. Amber is afraid of hurting Ronnie, so she removes herself—bringing about the very thing she was trying to avoid. Relationships are complicated.

Losing in Love is a small film, narrow in focus, yet timeless in theme. It is strong and true, written with uncommon intelligence and a complex understanding of human nature, longing, and eros. It is an antidote for the disease of narcissism, an exercise in selflessness that wisely warns against stumbling over into fatalism, the inherent danger that comes with the expenditure of self, even with the best of intentions. There's no guarantee that one's wounds will be healed; in fact, it's naive to think that another broken, miserable human being with scars of their own will be the balm to all the cuts and scrapes on your own soul. But to learn to love one in spite of those wounds? That's another story. And that's the story Losing in Love is interested in telling.