With his 2021 film Dinner in America, director Adam Carter Rehmeier revived the career of actor Kyle Gallner, who has since caught the eye of cinemagoers with his roles in the Smile series and Strange Darling. Rehmeier and Gallner reunite for Carolina Caroline, and once again the latter plays a charming sociopath who sweeps a restless young woman off her feet. The tone is less comic this time, and Carolina Caroline is a lot more maudlin than the post-Tarantino vibes of its trailer might suggest.
Gallner is paired here with Samara Weaving, another star who has cornered the indie market but somehow failed to convince Hollywood that she has what it takes to headline mainstream fare. Weaving plays Caroline, a small town girl who is fed up of small town life but has never convinced herself to escape its confines. One day while working a shift in a gas station she sees Oliver (Gallner) walk away with an extra 10 dollars after pulling the same banknote trick Joe Mantegna teaches Lindsay Crouse in David Mamet's House of Games. Fascinated by Oliver, Caroline follows him to a local bar where a mutual seduction occurs. Bidding farewell to her father (Jon Gries), Caroline hits the road with Oliver in search of criminal adventure.
The influence of Mamet's film continues in explicit fashion as Oliver teaches his blonde apprentice a variety of con tricks. Caroline falls for criminality as heavily as she falls for Oliver, and is easily talked into joining Oliver in upping the stakes and holding up banks.
The audience gets swept up in the misadventures of this Gen X Bonnie and Clyde (the movie is set in the '90s, when such crimes were far easier to pull off) thanks to some energetic direction from Rehmeier and the whip crack editing of Justin Krohn. Cinematographer Jean-Philippe Bernier captures the warm glow of America's southern states with their endless horizons promising untold freedom. A soundtrack of alt-country tunes by the likes of Townes Van Zandt and Emmylou Harris adds to the very American sense of rebellion of our anti-heroes.
Carolina Caroline taps into the desire we all secretly harbour to duck out of polite society and live a life of freedom. But it eventually reminds us that one person's freedom usually comes at someone else's expense. Oliver makes a convincing case for his lifestyle when he talks about how we're all being exploited by more powerful forces, but Caroline can't see how she's being exploited by Oliver. It is telling that Oliver allows Caroline to stick up banks while he waits in the car outside, giving him the ability to make a quick getaway if things go south. Whenever Caroline asks a question he doesn't have a ready made answer for, Oliver avoids the subject by embracing her. Caroline's realisation that her American dream is coming apart hits home during an encounter with her mother (Kyra Sedgwick), who walked out on her as an infant and makes it clear that she has no interest in becoming a mother at this late point.
There isn't much here that we haven't seen in numerous movies about attractive young lovers traversing America on crime sprees. But what makes Carolina Caroline work is its investment in its romantic angle. This is a movie that generates heat, with Weaving and Gallner the sort of sexy pairing that regularly fuelled thrillers in the days when Hollywood made movies for adults. It's easy to see why either of these rogues might convince us to drop everything and hit the road in a muscle car. Carolina Caroline is a sexy and thrilling ride, up until the point when it becomes more melancholic and reminds us that achieving true freedom requires a sociopath's disregard for anyone who blocks their path.
Directed by: Adam Carter Rehmeier
Starring: Samara Weaving, Kyle Gallner, Kyra Sedgwick, Jon Gries
