If you have been to the Alamo Drafthouse in the last 6 months for what seemed like any feature, you would have seen Aubrey Plaza’s face plastered across the screen backed by an honest-to-god banger. The trailer implied a desperate loner moves out to California to stalk an instagram crush to what appears to be great success while meeting eccentric people on the way. The title was crystal clear, Ingrid Goes West, and replaying the trailer in my head twice as many times as trips to the Drafthouse, my expectations went north. But, if you looked closer, you could see some cracks at the corners of the facade. #Suspicious

Put on your best skeptic’s grin, because this film is not sold as billed. This film falls somewhere between The King Of Comedy and The Cable Guy, or maybe a really sad version of Peewee Herman’s Big Adventure and less surreal. It’s incredibly grounded, which is the opposite of what you might think of when you think of stalkers. Ingrid is at moments unhinged, but unceasingly steadfast in getting what she wants. However, the film never paints her as a mastermind of manipulation nor incapable of hearing and understanding the people around her. This isn’t Fatal Attraction or Single White Female, but a very real tale of fascination, exploitation, depression, and unrealistic expectations. Leaving the film, my girlfriend was upset that the film doesn’t push the envelope, but I felt anymore and it would find itself in the familiar territory of Hollywood hyperbole. #DateNight

The trailer also makes it sound like you are going to get a wild ride, with synthy-indie pop hits, crazy neon (Drafthouse production house Neon withstanding), and skeptical glances. Once the curtain rises, the soundtrack is much more subdued, with winding, rising keyboard tones with intermittent silence that increase the tension and feelings of anxiety. Aubrey Plaza does an incredible job pulling you into her crazy and you instantly feel bad for her, even without knowing almost anything about her character’s background. On the other end of the spectrum, Elizabeth Olsen plays the instagram diva with such ridiculous accuracy, by the end you feel like you can finally feel comfortable believing that behind the insta-filter is nothing but filler and empty consumerism. It is gorgeous. O’Shea Jackson Jr. is not the thug or drug dealer youth image of his father’s era. Instead, he plays the shorthand for the new male millennial, paramountly an otaku to such an extreme that every conversation is in some way a metaphor or simile to his obsession, and yet they still perform well enough to have a car, house, safe drug habit, and a bank account. #NotAllMillenials

Ultimately, Matt Spicer honed in on something, not raw but nevertheless real. It doesn’t have the feel of an instant classic, but it definitely sits next to some of the best stalker films out there. Not for being outrageous, but for fine tuning a kind of John Water’s mentality without all the wacky, campy quirks plastered throughout the film. Paired closely with a cellphone, Ingrid Goes West is much more indie than mainstream, a hit new app everyone cool is talking about and you’re old tech savvy uncles aren’t using. Even though I feel a bit lied to, I found no hint of buyer’s remorse. #TakeAChance

~* 8/10 *~