The Motel Life

Sensitive lensing and acting render an unusual story of brotherly love touching in a promising first film.

Alan Polsky and Gabriel Polsky propel the material in a way that can feel over-determined. But they grasp the eccentricities and desperation of fringe dwellers, and at its strongest their atmospheric film has the pull of a sad outlaw song.

We have seen many films about losers on the run, but in the directorial debut of former Chicago siblings Alan and Gabe Polsky, we get an intriguing new take on brotherly love not only gone wrong, but clearly hopeless from the beginning.

This independent drama effectively captures the spirit of much contemporary fiction: the tone is at once precious and stark, and the narrative drifts from one episode to another (and from realism to fantasy) as though it were playing out in a dream.

As good as "The Motel Life" is for the actors, that's how bad it is for the viewer.

It's occasionally pretentious but ultimately moving, at least for the miniscule audience that will turn out to see such a downer of a movie.

A pedestrian, undeveloped indie clunker, its failure as a complete, satisfying story especially disappointing since the sibling relationship at its center could have been special with a better script.

Watching The Motel Life, I felt that I was in the hands of someone capable of making a great film.

There's definitely a niche audience out there that will love The Motel Life; and this is a film that deserves to be loved.

The whole thing is deep-down conservative and wetter than a Labrador's kiss.

The rambling plot may resemble a lyric from a mawkish country song but the film-makers bring an engaging mix of tenderness and grit to the downbeat material.

The film is heavy-going, unformed and self-indulgent, with characters who are neither sympathetic nor (crucially) interesting.