2024 Entry #32 04-09-24 “Elena Undone” is a 2010 romantic lesbian drama film which was written and directed by openly lesbian creative Nicole Conn (“Claire of the Moon”, “Little Man” & “More Beautiful for Having Been Broken”), loosely based on her romance with filmmaker Marina Rice Bader. The title character, Elena Winters (Necar Zadegan), is married to a cis male pastor named Barry (Gary Weeks), and they have a son named Nash (Connor Kramme). Elena crosses paths with Peyton Lombard (Traci Dinwiddie) and the two connect so intensely that it breaks Elena out of the malaise of her existence and embarks on a happier, more honest life.
I liked a big chunk of this movie; the part that plays at being a serious drama with the best of intentions but feels more like something you’d find buried in the back of the video store. But I disliked a lot of it as well, which mostly had to do with the chosen structure. The narrator, Tyler (played by the openly gay Sam Harris), has this new-agey, “two flames” or “twin flames” mentality that permeates the film and makes it all seem sillier at times than it needs to be. He has a series of interviews between happy couples throughout the film, including one between a pair who both have Dissociative Identity Disorder, and only one personality of either likes the other person’s specific personality. It was bizarre and could have worked for comedy if the rest of the movie had been funnier…and maybe it was meant to be? But I wasn’t laughing. And the sex scenes, which were kind of the point, were also repetitive and uninspired, which is a shame. Another repetitive element was the unending music, none of which I enjoyed overly much. Also… there’s a very odd pregnancy storyline at the end of the movie which seemed to contradict nearly everything that came before it and which felt like an attempt at a creative shortcut rather than anything making any kind of actual sense. So there’s that.
The leads are attractive but the acting is pretty wooden across the board, yet sometimes you want a cheesy, poorly acted lesbian romance movie – or at least I do. Indeed, the director’s first film, “Claire of the Moon” is just such a move (it’s actually kind of awful) but I adore it! I have music from it on my Amazon Playlist. Basically, if you saw this movie and you loved it or you were inspired by it (like the baby gay who recommended it to me), I’m not knocking it. We all have our little favorites. But I’ll likely stick to my own cheesy Nicole Conn lesbian romance movie in future! Lol