Summer Shorts: The Crab

USA, 2010
Director Rona Mark
102 min
Language: english / russian subtitles

Edinburg International Film Festival — official selection
Rotterdam International Film Festival — official selection
Stockholm International Film Festival — official selection

His ’crab hands’ form a welcome excuse for the blunt cynicism with which Levi keeps everyone at arm’s length. Disappointed by life, he gets on with his daily affairs. In this anti-romantic comedy, only his love for his only friend’s girlfriend offers him some hope, albeit false.

Levi is a cynical creep who manages to get up everyone’s nose with his snide remarks. Since dropping out of college, he lives as an unemployed, self-destructive drunkard, treats his girlfriend as a doormat and invites beatings from total strangers.
He hates himself and above all his ‘lobster hands’, a birth defect. But it isn’t his malformed hands that scare people off, it’s his monstrous behavior. When the new girlfriend of his only friend is not impressed by Levi’s torrent of abuse, he immediately falls for her.
Highbrow meets low culture in this intelligent, verbal comedy about a melancholy anti-hero with a heart of gold. Just like Strange Girls, Rona Marks’ bizarre debut film about the vicissitudes of a creepy set of twins, this American independent is clever, lightly absurd and hilarious, thanks to dialogues like whiplashes and a protagonist who is perfectly cast. The ultimate anti-romantic comedy.