Izzy Gets The F*ck Across Town (2018)

3 Stars (out of 4)

From Point 'A' to Point 'F'

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

There's very little at stake in this spunky little indie comedy, and that's part of its charm; Mackenzie Davis (Blade Runner 2049, Tully) is endearing, and the So. California locations and characters are warmly, lazily quirky.

In Izzy Gets the F*ck Across Town, the flaky, stuck-in-a-rut Izzy (Davis) wakes up in the bed of a man (Lakeith Stanfield) she barely remembers. They compare notes, she gathers up her clothes, a wine-stained, black-and-white catering uniform from the night before, and checks her messages. She's shocked to discover that her ex Roger (Alex Russell) is having an engagement party (to which she has not been invited), and she immediately decides to crash it.

Her car has been with her mechanic friend Dick (Brandon T. Jackson) for weeks and is still not ready, so she tries other methods to get across town. She begs friends and acquaintances for help, steals a scooter, and gets sidetracked by colorful characters even loonier than she is. Will she reach the party? And if she does, what does her future hold?

Izzy Gets the F*ck Across Town is mini-quest, a hangover-induced micro-odyssey that encompasses little more than wandering around and having a weird day, but Christian Papierniak, making his feature writing and directing debut, keeps the stakes just high enough to keep Izzy in a state of perpetual "I can't believe this." She's a flake, and most of her misfortune is her own fault, but she seems to realize that; her truthfulness is appealing.

Papierniak's choice of supporting actors and their own weird situations is inspired, including Stanfield as a seductive helicopter pilot, Haley Joel Osment as a softie who has fallen in love with his one-night stand, Alia Shawkat as that one-night stand, and the squeaky-voiced Annie Potts as a kind of neighborhood soothsayer. Though the story is romantically motivated, Papierniak avoids fairy-tale fluff and digs right into to the heart of the matter.

The movie truly comes alive in one sequence, when Izzy encounters her sister (Carrie Coon) and the two play a song together; the crossing close-ups of the women and the fury of the song come enticingly close to revealing her whole heart.