Joel Veach, who wrote the tense two-hander Old Man (2022), makes his directorial debut with this very good small town, small-scale crime thriller. It's a compact, potent tale about generational violence, as well as its ultimate cost.
Ray (David Thompson) is a mechanic in a dusty auto shop. He speaks in a sleepy grumble and has a shock of floppy hair he continuously pushes away from his right eye. Every so often, his work is interrupted by a tingling bell. We learn that his father lies behind a curtain (we never see him), deathly ill, and on his last legs. Ray brings him things to drink from time to time. Meanwhile, two Jules-and-Vincent-like bagmen in bolo ties simply called "One" (Brendan Sexton III) and "Two" (Gbenga Akinnagbe), arrive on the scene. They happen upon a wounded coyote, which "One" seems to think is some kind of sign. They work for a crime lord named Frank Landis (whom we never see either). Ray owes a little north of $100,000 to Frank, and "One" and "Two" arrive at the garage to collect.
Just as they are about to break Ray's arm, his sister, Maggie (Liana Wright-Mark), arrives. They give Ray until noon the next day to get the money. Needless to say, things come down to the wire. Veach has a knack for dialogue, especially conversations; the best scenes are between Ray and Maggie after the bagmen leave, and a surprising scene in which the bagmen visit a fortune teller. (He may be inspired by Tarantino, but he's not a copycat; his work is less homage and more about life experience.) He seems to be a natural storyteller as well, doling out information in measured ways and finding the most interesting ways to frame situations (such as not showing two key characters).
The story has one large leap of logic, a suspension of disbelief almost too big to be surmounted: Ray assumes that he can collect his newly-deceased father's life insurance the very next morning, even though he did not call a coroner and has no death certificate. (Come to think of it, what did they even do with the corpse?) That aside, American Muscle is a potent tale of the long-term effects of abuse. The title comes from Ray and Maggie's father, a thing he claims that they must develop in order to survive a cruel world. Maggie managed to escape this cycle, but Ray is tragically stuck. And everything is crumbling around him.
