Sour Party

Sour Party (2023)

Amanda Drexton | Michael Drexton

*screened as part of @chattfilmfest #chattfilmfest #respectcinema 

We first meet lifelong friends Gwen (Samantha Westervelt) and James (Amanda Drexton) during a plant heist from a neighbor’s yard. As an audience, we wonder what form of altruistic liberation these two embody by freeing these plants from undeserving yards? The answer is none. This is simply a scheme to steal succulents and sell them for scratch. Their plot is derailed by Reggie Watts. And inside this argument with concerned neighbor Reggie, we glimpse the beauty that Sour Party will offer for its remaining hour and twenty minutes.

The plot that strings together a series of delightful vignettes is simple and akin to The Big Lebowski or Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle. An outwardly meaningless goal sets up a series of misadventures. In the case of Sour Party, our protagonists go in search of owed debts to purchase the last baby gift on Gwen’s sister's registry. Gwen and James float through their daily existence until life asks more of them. A baby shower becomes the event that forces Gwen into an existential crisis. If she can show up with the perfect gift, then maybe she can show her family she isn’t the screw up they imagine her to be. The reality is, Gwen’s family merely wants her to show up with clean hair. The bar is set so low there’s no way Gwen can mess it up. Or is there?

24 hours to wash her hair, find a gift, and get to the baby shower. Gwen just needs to get to Santa Monica from LA proper. For the best friends Gwen and James, it’s going to be the longest 45 minute drive of their lives. With Sour Party, directors Amanda and Michael Drexton have traded a Raymond Chandler parody in Big Lebowski for the pursuit of new age baby gifts via gig economy restrictions. From succulent stealing, hot tub UTIs, neon fart smoke, cockroach cornucopias, and Corey Feldman cults, the Drextons provide an onslaught of trials and tribulations inside a Homer-esque odyssey for Baby Tarot.

Within this post-modern hero arch story, no one gains anything and nothing is lost. In true Lebowski fashion, we share only moments with Gwen and James in their absurdity. Sour Party is an absolute blast. It is pure fun from the first to final frame. It has the feeling of an 80’s comedy, when filmmakers were not afraid of having an elephant roaming a house party or a space laser making popcorn or having your star sing gorilla-style in the Chicago's Von Steuben Day Parade on Dearborn Street. There was unexpected chaos inside the best cult films from the 80s. The Drextons have recreated this magic – with a limited budget, and we’re here for it.