This movie is definitely unusual, but it doesn't seem to believe in itself or in the worth of its story, so by the end it falls flat and can only really be evaluated as a farce. We start out with Steve Buscemi and Peter Dinklage as a couple of clowns struggling through their jobs on some cable-access kids' show. Eventually we are introduced to a number of other characters whose lives all intersect over the course of one night (a la Magnolia/ Short Cuts/ Crash). Buscemi is always a solid character actor, but here he seems somewhat confused about his motivation and I can't really blame him. Rockwell is known as a very hands-off director, and I have to say that this movie seems to have just derailed on him, despite some touching visual concepts and decent, potentially explosive backstories. The scene in the swimming pool in which a priest who is going through a crisis of faith teams with Steve Buscemi to teach a sickly young boy how to swim is just so overstuffed with tropes as to completely destroy the viewer's attentiveness to any throughline or narrative thrust. The subplots are all individually interesting and are handled with at least a fair amount of investment and decent performance by nearly everyone involved. But they only intersect in odd ways that seem to desire to make some sort of larger statement but only end up in chaos, and perhaps a vague statement about everyone coming together to help solve their shared problems. But really it seems that Rockwell's strength is in showing people who are insane or in the absolute gutter, and so any kind of humanist impulse that he has is only articulated vaguely and without enough buildup to be moving. That being said, there are a number of intriguing minor characters in the film, and as I've mentioned it is filled with acting talent. It's almost like this is a movie where you want to extract assorted moments and enjoy them as if they were short films so that you don't have to cringe painfully at their inability to flow in the overall storyline. The brief moment where Ernie Lee Banks, as a zoo's night watchman, argues honestly with the bail bondsman and his son is touching, almost like something out of Magnolia. The character played by David Proval is taken almost directly out of the bail bondsman character in Jackie Brown, a film by Rockwell's friend Quentin Tarantino. That being said, Proval does a decent job with the muddled and cut-rate character he is assigned by the screenplay.I tried hard to like this movie but in the end it is so riddled with head-scratching loopholes and mistakes and poor transitions that I could only call it gutsy at best. I wouldn't call it great, and not even "good". Rockwell's use of hand-held video cameras didn't bother me, and if anything it was visually interesting. I guess the ending of this movie, without giving it entirely away, made me wonder if Rockwell was merely trying to "make up for" the dark comic sense or atmosphere of decay that permeates the rising action of the film. In any case, it just does not seem to flow and it does not fit organically with the rest of the bizarre story.

At first glance the initial scenery was enough to make me change the channel until I saw that Steve Buschemi was one of the leading characters. The dull grainy cinematography in combination with sad clowns performing poorly before a local TV station child audience, was enough to make me think, OK this is just weird.But even during those first few scenes I saw a dark humor typical of today's attitude towards the unfailing reality of life, so given that, I decided to watch on. What I witnessed was a film about one of those strange nights when the Moon is full, the mystical powers are strong in the air and the lives of strangers will cross.The relationships of these strangers center around the Bail bondsman "Mo" (David Proval) but the events of the night surround his estranged son "Timmy", whose mother comes to the father in a babysitting emergency. Unbeknownst to the father his son has only one kidney that is barely functioning and he is waiting a beeper call from the hospital for a donor. While this is happening most of the other characters also need Mo for Bail at the very same time, sort of a convergence of need all at one moment. After going to the Jailhouse to perform his duties, the child wanders out in the parking lot and almost gets hit by a car. At this very moment the story changes from a group of quirky adults trying to solve their own problems to a group of adults realizing that all of their selfish desires are nothing compared to the needs of this child. From this point forward the scene changes are chaotic and bizarre in a Pulp Fiction type fashion, but the message remains clear, even while whining about their pathetic lives these adults keep their focus and do all that they can do to help the boy and find his Kidney donor who has wandered out of the hospital.There are defining moments that will remain with the boy, the scene in the hospital, the trip his father takes after hours to the zoo to see the monkeys and when everyone jumps into the pool, giving the child a sense of joy you feel he has had yet to feel in his pitiful little life. There are several epiphanies amongst the cast of characters. One of my favorites is when the night watchman from the Zoo tells Mo "shooting me with that gun isn't going to make you a better father". In the end the child is saved by the supreme sacrifice of the priest "Owen", who had been suffering from doubts about his priesthood and searching for the meaning of his life.This Movie has genuine moments of dark humor and a very meaningful and happy ending. If your looking for something a little different that doesn't leave you feeling haunted, you will enjoy this movie.

This is yet another jerky, hackneyed "indie" film. The director sounds like a nice guy, at least he comes across that way in the multiple "behind the scenes" stories floating around on DVD and the Internet (www.nobodywantsyourfilm.com).Why Buscemi (and the extremely talented Dinklage) made this is beyond me, maybe they lost a bet? The film had an O.K. start and was set up for some interesting twists. Instead the filmmaker threw so many secondary characters into this (Stormare's crazy Santa, the priests, etc.) the plot just wanders around L.A. in the wee hours. But ending it with the cute kid getting a kidney (oh, please!) and a tearful ending just killed it dead.Nobody wants this film, damn straight.

This indie was shown recently on cable. Alexandre Rockwell (any relation to Sam?) directs this strange account of a night in L.A. While the film is interesting there are a lot of things that make absolute no sense in the way the director, working with Brandon Cole in the screen play, presents the story and then proceeds to solve it in the next 90 minutes.Mr. Rockwell has to be congratulated in employing these young talent. Given the choice between a studio film and and independent one, I will always choose the latter one. That said, there are a lot of unanswered questions in the film.We have no inkling at the beginning of the film that Timmy is a sick boy, he is suddenly in the hospital where a donor has been matched and will undergo a kidney transplant. The donor is Slovo, a man who was hit by the boy's father, and it's an obnoxious man. The quest for the search of this man, who disappeared from the hospital, is at the core of the action. It gives the writers an excuse for bringing the assorted characters into the picture.Another thing that doesn't make sense is how can anyone be arrested for attending a T&A club? Evidently it can only happen in the city of Angels! There is the rapper with the gorgeous girlfriend who can't carry a tune who come to help the boy and his father and in the process take us into the streets of a seedy section of town and end up in the rapper's mansion where everyone jumps in the pool.There are a lot things that don't make sense, but we go along the ride because the director, at times, shows signs of brilliant film making, but ultimate, the movie leaves us questioning a lot of things as to why they happen.The cast is wonderful. Daryl Mitchell and Rose Collins are perfect as the rapper and his girlfriend. Steve Buscemi and Peter Dinklage as the clowns, don't get a lot to do. Pruitt Taylor Vince, an actor's actor makes an incredible Owen, the man who will eventually save the boy. David Proval and Elizabeth Bracco are the estranged parents of the sick young boy, Timmy, who is portrayed with an uncanny maturity by Austin Wolff. Jennifer Beals and Sam Rockwell have only limited time in front of the camera.While we wished "13 Moons" would have been better, it shows a great team of writers as well as an excellent director.