If it’s March in Texas, that can mean only one thing. Beyond the bluebonnets sprouting up on the side of the road again, it also means the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival is underway in Austin, TX. A congregation of big movie premieres, concerts, keynote speakers, and other entertainment offerings, has been bringing travelers and artists from all walks of life since 1987. Though it was founded in the year of "Nothing's Gonne Stop Us Now," SXSW continues to be an urgently relevant place for artists from all walks of life.
Like I've done for The Spool in years past, I’m once again covering SXSW virtually this year, though this time my reviews are for the good folks at Culturess. Me being at home in Dallas, TX means I won’t be covering the biggest premieres at this festival like The Accountant 2 or Another Simple Favor, but hey, I can review those in a few weeks when they hit general release. Film festivals should be about covering and exploring pieces of art that aren’t as accessible to the general public. For movie geeks, these big film festivals should an opportunity to discover tinier motion pictures from all over the world that may struggle to get U.S. distribution.
In my virtual and in-person film festival exploits in years past, this is how I discovered unforgettable titles like Cannibal Mukbang, The Battle, Leonor Will Never Die, Riotsville U.S.A., and others. These are the kinds of smaller-scale projects I’m hoping to experience in my SXSW Culturess coverage and I’ll hope you’ll join me on this journey! Between now and March 15 (when SXSW 2025 concludes), I’ll be providing a handful of Culturess SXSW pieces that feature capsule reviews of new releases either premiering or screening at SXSW 2025. Today, we begin with reviews of two movies that just dropped at this festival…
I Really Love My Husband (dir. G.G. Hawkins)
I Really Love My Husband is a “cosmic gumbo” (as a wise Santa Claus might say) of different cinematic influences. Its intentionally ramshackle dialogue sometimes evoke Duplass Brothers indie films of the 2000s. Its basic plot, meanwhile, of a married couple, Teresa (Madison Lanesey) and Drew (Travis Quentin Young), encountering endless strife with each other on their long-delayed tropical island honeymoon conjures up memories of Elaine May works like A New Leaf and The Heartbreak Kid. Screenwriters G.G. Hawkins, Lanesey, and Scott Monahan, meanwhile, lather the proceedings (especially Teresa's awkward displays of barely contained contempt for Drew) in cringe comedy that would make Nathan Fielder proud.
These elements coalesce to tell a saga of Teresa clearly being fed up with the chipper, good-natured Drew as they settle in for a “joyous” honeymoon. The arrival of Paz (Arta Gee), though, throws a wrench into the proceedings. Teresa is incredibly attracted to Paz and finally feels a romantic spark that’s been missing from her life. With that, she keeps on insisting to Drew that all three of them should have a sexual experience together. It’s a plot that, much like Forgetting Sarah Marshall or any White Lotus season, demonstrates how the sunniest locales can house the messiest interpersonal drama.
The greatest element of I Really Love My Husband is how it feels so discernibly modern without lapsing into tired signifiers of a story taking place in 2025 (like having characters make disparaging comments about TikTok). An early scene (told with sharp bits of comic timing in the editing) cutting between Teresa and Drew trying to work out their relationship issues with modern therapeutic lingo exemplifies this quality. The camera keeps cutting to the pair in various spots in their rental home saying things like “I see you” without really understanding the larger physical and emotional efforts that need to underscore those phrase. Teresa and Drew are social media-savvy enough to know what to say. However, they think just spouting the right Tumblr terminology will solve everything. They’re still in the dark on how to actually care for the others needs. That’s a quintessentially 2025 problem right there.
Between that, the commitment to letting Teresa just be a messy jerk (cinema always needs more “unlikeable” lady protagonists) and keeping me genuinely unsure of where its story was going, I Really Love My Husband’s script is solidly-crafted. Who knows, though, is this screenplay would stand up to repeat viewings. With the suspense over what turmoil will unfold next evaporated, would I Really Love My Husband still engage narratively? Hawkins and cinematographer Ryan Thomas, meanwhile, don't imbue the proceedings with quite as much striking cinematography, unfortunately. Even an obligatory drug trip sequence in the third act doesn’t break up the film’s visual monotony.
Still, the island backdrops are lovely as heck and the performances from the main players are nicely realized. Travis Quentin Young especially rocks portraying Drew as an amiable fellow that doesn’t quite lapse into the obnoxiousness one might expect at the start of the runtime. I Really Love My Husband can’t evade either certain shortcomings of modern indie comedies (namely the more rudimentary imagery) nor being overshadowed by its pop culture influences. Conjuring up memories of Elaine May or Nathan Fielder is both a blessing and a curse! However, any movie that keeps me wondering “where on Earth are we going next?” is worth lauding. Plus, the ways I Really Love My Husband feels so discernibly 2025 are a breath of fresh air in a cinematic landscape .
American Sons (dir. Andrew James Gonzales)
As countless war movies (both narrative and documentaries) have shown, the battle for soldiers in wartime doesn't end once the actual combat on the ground concludes. The psychological trauma of war endures forever, as the group of Marines at the center of American Sons can attest. These men fought in Afghanistan in the 2000s and lost their dear friend Corporal JV Villarreal in 2010. American Sons chronicles these men grappling with their mental health struggles in 2020 and 2021 while also dealing with unending sorrow over losing Villarreal.
The most moving American Sons segments are also some of its most intimate. It’d take a heart of stone to not get choked up at the sight of Villarreal’s mom clutching a teddy bear decked out in cammo that she sometimes refers to as “JV”. Similarly moving are moments where the veterans get deeply raw and vulnerable. They’re all coping with ceaseless psychological torment in various ways, from relying too heavily on pills to rapping about their emotions to nighttime phone calls with each other. These soldiers are relying on wildly varying tools beyond just guns to fight this battle in civilian life.
Unfortunately, American Sons is way too scattered to make room for many of these moving displays of intimacy. For starters, director Andrew James Gonzales refuses to linger in one time period for too long. The jumps between 2000s archival footage shot by Villarreal to various spits in the 2020s are incredibly awkward. Potentially interesting material (like an off-hand mention that Villarreal’s veterans didn’t regularly interact with his family until recently) only manifest as throwaway pieces of narration. Various soldiers in Villarreal’s unit are also just background players until they’re abruptly staring down the camera sharing their points-of-view. Their words are admirably raw, but the lack of build-up to these souls makes the camera suddenly focusing just on them more hurried than touching. Running just 59 minutes, American Sons needed to give viewers more time to know these people.
American Sons also can’t evade the sense that its form and on-screen material isn’t as subversive as it could be. These veterans came from training that emphasized firing guns and screaming in the field (so that you can be heard over loud weaponry) rather than expressing emotions. While the on-screen vulnerability subverts Marine norms, American Sons manifests with a standard form and a deeply sentimental score both reminiscent of countless other documentaries. Each soldier’s experience with PTSD and other mental health struggles related to war are unique. American Sons, though, is bogged down with derivative and scattershot filmmaking.