Holly (a wonderful Azura Skye) is a dedicated wife and mother who endlessly puts her family’s needs before her own. Her selflessness, however, brings her not gratitude or appreciation, but instead mean-spirited disdain. The more she tries to help, the more she is brow-beaten by the ingrates she cares for and who walk all over her. Holly is on the verge of a breakdown, but how it manifests and when are what keeps The Swerve interesting through its near-constant unpleasantness.
The Swerve can be difficult to watch at times. It’s not overly graphic or violent, but the massive weight that hangs over Holly is severe and uncomfortable. She is an abused woman but is just beginning to understand this. Her husband, sons, and even mother and sister treat her as an emotional punching bag with endless snide insults and passive-aggressive poking. When her attempts at assertiveness are met with mockery and accusations of hysterics, it becomes clear that she may have to resort to more direct tactics before anyone will listen to her or even see her as a human being.
As she unravels, director Dean Kapsalis is careful to make sure we understand her torment, even if no one else in the film can see it or would even believe it if she spoke up. Channeling an inner-Gena Rowlands, Skye, as Holly, makes us believe too. As her identity is eroded and her behavior becomes more erratic and extreme, we follow her into a surreal and terrifying world of uncertainty and paranoia that cannot possibly end well.
What’s more, it becomes increasingly apparent that what we are witnessing, or at least parts of it, may be a hallucination. Holly is unhinged, that’s evident, but it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly where she is in her breakdown. Her pain, though, is undeniable and certainly understandable. Her kids are rotten, her husband a clod, and her sister a self-centered, perpetual victim who passes her shortcomings onto others. Kapsalis sets up a tragedy and we nearly root for bad things to happen to these terrible people, which may reveal as much about ourselves as it does Holly.
This a grim film, and one that works much more than it doesn’t. Its purposefully muddled first two-thirds may throw viewers off with its ambivalence, but as the third act approaches, clarity emerges in the story and in Holly’s resolve. It also becomes clear that Holly’s eventual plan of action has been hinted at for the entire film – a realization that may come with mixed results depending on your tolerance for foreshadowing and ability to spot it. Maybe you see it coming, maybe you don’t, but either way, what happens next is grisly.
James is a writer, skateboarder, record collector, wrestling nerd, and tabletop gamer living with his family in Asheville, North Carolina. He is a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association, the North Carolina Film Critics Association, and contributes to The Daily Orca, Razorcake Magazine, Mountain Xpress, and Asheville Movies.