Bail Jumper

Writer/director Christian Faber's debut feature film is a quirky little road movie which tries to meld the you-and-me-against-the-world outlaw intimacy of Bonnie and Clyde with the droll approach of Stranger Than Paradise. Joe (B. J. Spaulding), stealer of stereos, and Elaine (Eszter Balint), a K-Mart kleptomaniac, meet, fall in love, and decide to leave the miserable burg of Murky Springs, MO for the bright lights, big city of New York. No flat tires or empty gas tanks for these travelers: Joe and Elaine leave in the wake of a tornado, have a meteorite plop through their windshield, are rained on by a literal plague of locusts, and set up house on Staten Island only to be greeted by a tsunami. Joe and Elaine are natural disaster prone, to say the least. While the absurdity of the goings on provides a few choice chuckles, Bail Jumper never becomes much more than a semi-diverting oddity. Spaulding, in the lead, appears to have little if any previous acting experience, and Faber's too carefully planned idiosyncratic scenes often ring false because the actors don't have the comic timing necessary to make them work. Still, there are enough good moments in Bail Jumper to satisfy the off the beaten track video hunter, so libraries with extensive independent feature collections may want to consider this. Recommended, with reservations. (R. Pitman)