The Wake

alt='FN'/>Set in Minneapolis and St. Paul, nobody is a movie for MSP lovers, artists and indie folk. The movie stars Lindeman (local actor Sam Rosen), a frustrated graduate student at Minneapolis College of Art and Design. After being declared “done with therapy” by his shrink, he struggles to find a way to regain the ever-so-inspiring depression that had guided his previous projects. The drama of the film unfolds as Lindeman becomes more and more frustrated with a looming final critique and only a few ideas for his final sculpture that, in his words, “kinda sucks.” As he experiments with such subjects as death, love, homosexuality and militant veganism, Lindeman realizes whoring himself out to the various philosophies and radical lifestyles of his colleagues will not give him the unique identity he is looking for. He is, instead, nobody, a realization that eventually lends Lindeman the type of motivation he needs.

Written and directed by Rob Perez, the director of Forty Days and Forty Nights, the movie explores the reassuring desperation and endearment of the occasional lack of profundity that even the best artists experience. Aside from a few complete misrepresentations of Minneapolis winters (swimming in a lake in April, brainstorming outside in February), the movie has much to enjoy. Mix pretentious artists, human-sized vegetables, gothic death-centered social circles, an immobile goat and St. Paul’s very own Porky’s restaurant together with some good shots of Minneapolis and an excellent soundtrack, and you’ve got the recipe for a jolly good local movie.

Tags: local film, minneapolis film, mpls filmmaking, nobody, rob perez