We've all seen the stars who make it. But what about those who don't? Amazon Falls tackles that very question.

Amazon Falls

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The more things change, the more they stay the same. Amazon Falls, in ways, is a modern, if ruthlessly self-aware, take on classic literary Hollywood narratives: It’s set in L.A.’s final frontier, where, 50 years after the last true film noir was released, it’s still the place where dreams are made (or in the case of most actors or members of the Clippers, killed).

Actress Jana (April Telek) stands right on the line of death or glory. Or so she’d have you believe. Having once starred in a few minor hit action features — playing an Amazon renegade, in something probably resembling the inbred spawn of Xena: Warrior Princess and Rambo — she is, like so many starry-eyed hopefuls, waitressing, waiting for her big break. Unlike her nubile, fresh-faced competition, though, she’s soon turning 40, a fact that she’s hardly willing to confront. (Though it doesn’t stop plenty of other characters, who are quick to remind that she’s “been around forever!”)

That denial reaches levels of Barry Bonds proportions. She lies, or at least exaggerates, consistently to her absentee parents, telling them that she’s won non-existent lead film roles. She lives vicariously through her young, pretty frenemy protégé Li (Anna Mae Routledge), jealous of her career advancement. She dates, and supports, a younger DJ (Zak Santiago), knowingly ignoring his infidelity and pesky nose-packing drug habit. She alienates her wizened, motherly agent (Gabrielle Rose) by venomously turning down dinner-theatre roles — if you’ll believe her, Jana is entitled to more.

In short, Jana fucking sucks.

But for all her posturing, she’s hardly detestable, and that’s a credit to the depth and oddball quirk displayed by Amazon Falls. In fact, it’s hard not to feel for her: Shot frequently behind chain-link fences, she’s evidently on the outside looking in. While Hollywood hands out hand-jobs and mirrored energizers, her persistence is gleefully naïve — she spends her time hounding directors and riding her exercise bike. And while the spectre of dirty money looms — with skeezy director Calvin (played by William B. Davis, the cigarette smoking man from the X-Files!) offering her gobs of cash for a hardly mysterious “lead” role — Jana is steadfast, displaying a befuddling grit.

Indeed, Amazon Falls manages to stir pathos, and it’s easy to understand the positive press it garnered when it debuted at TIFF last year. At times deliriously odd, at times painfully gritty, and at times drop-dead hilarious (see one audition, where Jane repeats “I’m built for your pleasure” in a Russian accent), this is an incredible feature debut for Calgary-born director Katrin Bowen — here, she works with a naturalistic script and navigates a variety of tones with ease.

Part of that, too, relies on the quietly brilliant casting. Each of Amazon Falls’s lesser-light actors delivers a solid performance, and a quick IMDB scan reveals why: Telek is a former Miss Canada winner. Santiago moonlights as a Vancouver DJ. Routledge has built a career on bit TV parts. And Davis is, well, the fucking cigarette smoking man from the X-Files. If each performance feels natural, it should.

Still, Amazon Falls never revels in meta snarkiness — and that, perhaps, is why it’s so appealing. While there are Hollywood prostitution parables aplenty, it never veers into preachy moralism, world-weary bitterness or see-through parody. And, if Jana’s bitterness doesn’t eventually take hold, this could be Bowen’s coming out party, too.