The two bears of the title are a woman and a man, 30-something backpackers, first seen walking out of a shopping mall. The man barters with a little girl peering out of a car, trades a copy of Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil for French fries. The pair then goes to an apartment building, where they work the lock of one unit, and enter to find the place barren, no furniture except for a big bed with a pristine, unmade mattress. They strip down in individual bathrooms and shower, the woman languishing, the man screaming as if burned. They fall asleep on the mattress, the man getting up to lay out cardboard to sleep on.
“Goldilocks” is the owner of the apartment. She arrives to find the two bears there, asleep. Hence, Goldilocks and the Two Bears.
The women hit it off. The squatter, Ingrid, is tall and brunette. The owner, Ivy, is shorter and blonde. They retreat to a park so as not to wake the man, Ian, and exchange anecdotes. Ingrid, Ivy, Ian. Later we’ll meet Irena. Sense a pattern? Who is the I, the I, the I?
What could easily turn into an indie gabfest takes on nuance. The tales Ivy and Ingrid tell are by turns trite, provocative, and fantastical. Their chat is fueled by Ivy’s growing fascination with the more bohemian Ingrid. The women talk and bond, Ian wakes up and speaks in riddles. The squatters claim that as soon as Grandma arrives (it’s really her apartment), they’ll depart and squat somewhere else.
Tones and locations will change. Blackouts end scenes at the most beguiling juncture, always a surprise. Characters suddenly break the fourth wall and address the viewer. But it’s not showy. It’s part of a subtle and intricate tapestry that leads us back around to the stories Ingrid and Ivy tell each other.
This film shouldn’t work but it does. Goldilocks and the Two Bears (more about that title in a second) is the work of independent writer/director Jeff Lipsky. Mr. Lipsky cites as his inspiration Covid (isolation and separation), and his move from NYC to Las Vegas (culture mindfuck). G&TTB is set in Vegas, 2016.
I’m tempted to tell more of the plot, but its strength is the guilelessness with which it unspools. The actors’ skills make it work. They are relatively new faces, and they sell their characters without a hint of indie self-consciousness. Serra Naiman (Ingrid) exudes a vagabond’s free spirit yet seethes underneath. We presume Claire Milligan (Ivy) to be naive, but her shrewd cat’s eyes betray her growing infatuation with these two “broke junkies.” Bryan Mittelstadt is stoic as Ian, boyish, a self-styled sage who becomes cold and sinister. He uses Nietzsche’s phrase “Truth is a Woman” like a password of trust. None of the actors have appeared in major films but here show disarming confidence.
Mr. Lipsky has a keen sensibility and an eye for detail. Painting the bare walls of the apartment invites a shift in mood. Ian’s homemade bookshelf is stocked with worn copies of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Joseph Heller’s Something Happened, Dorothy Parker’s collected works, and Men and Menstruation. Phobias abound. Ivy welcomes the intruders because she fears being alone. Ingrid fears dogs, specifically getting scratched by them. On a trip to the Strat Tower the trio encounters and woman who asks them to take her daughter up because she herself is scared of heights.
Jeff Lipsky has other films to his credit—including The Last Nazi (2019) and Mad Women (2015)—and if they are half as well-realized as this one, I have a new auteur’s works to anticipate.
But that title. Goldilocks and the Two Bears is a serious film and one to be admired. That title implies a facile satire of a popular fairytale. This movie is more than that, and the title might just misdirect people and keep them away. Mr. Lipsky, consider renaming it before it goes into wide release. Maybe something like “Squatters Rites”?
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Goldilocks and the Two Bears. Directed by Jeff Lipsky. 2024. In theaters. 136 minutes.