Leap Year

Laura (Monica del Carmen), a young Mexican woman suffering from depression and loneliness as the anniversary approaches of a painful event in her life, gives herself over to a month-long chain of casual, often violent sex in Michael Rowe's provocative, challenging, but also deliberately paced and sexually explicit Leap Year. Some will find this a powerful and strangely moving portrait of despair and self-destruction; but others are likely to be alternately repelled by graphic, intentionally ugly bedroom scenes, and bored by counterpoint sequences—for the most part tediously static shots of the protagonist eating, watching television, spying on her neighbors, or talking on the phone to her mother and the magazine editors who hire her to write freelance articles. The only respite comes during periodic visits from her younger brother, but even these moments—like the matter-of-fact telephone conversations—are merely designed to show the deceptively “normal” act she puts on for her family. What she really desires, it becomes increasingly clear, is to be abused, humiliated, and perhaps even killed by one of the partners she invites into her apartment. Rowe exhibits masterful control of the medium; each shot is precisely calibrated to use the dingy, oppressive surroundings to reflect Laura's psychological pain. And Monica del Carmen gives a fearlessly revealing performance as the troubled lead. But Leap Year is the sort of dark, disturbing work that will appeal to only the most adventurous of viewers. Optional. (F. Swietek)