Red Rocket

It's baffling. Sean Baker makes films about the working poor – Tangerine, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket are about people living on the margins of the economy. But his films are filled with contempt for their subjects.

Red Rocket is the best of these movies. I honestly enjoyed this film for most of its running time. Baker conceals his lack of empathy for the characters for most of the movie – we feel as though some of them might succeed (at least on their own terms), I hoped for them to succeed. But Baker doesn't believe they can succeed. He throws new plot developments at them that destroy their hopes and make them look foolish. I was really with this movie, and then (just like with The Florida Project) Red Rocket's end demonstrates that Baker thinks the people in the stories he tells are just some sort of comic fun.

But let me shut up about Sean Baker, because the real story here is that Simon Rex is fucking fantastic in this movie. He honestly and truly deserves an Academy Award nomination. It's a flat-out brilliant performance.