Dopamine Review
by Harvey S. Karten (harveycritic AT cs DOT com)September 30th, 2003
DOPAMINE
Reviewed by: Harvey S. Karten
Grade: B+
Sundance Channel
Directed by: Mark Decena
Written by: Timothy Breitbach, Mark Decena
Cast: John Livingston, Sabrina Lloyd, Bruno Campos, Reuben Grundy, William Windom, Nicole Wilder
Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 9/29/03
The film's theme song, which begins, "Sarah, Sarah,/ So easy to look At,/ So hard to define" is a clue to the inner life of "Dopamine," a Sundance Film Series feature which explores the very nature of love. Writers Timothy Breitbach and Mark Decena look into the nature of attraction. Sarah is pleasant to look at, but how do we define our attraction to her? The big question that directory Mark Decena poses: "Is love just a physiological reaction, a biochemical release of the pleasure substance dopamine; or is love something that transcends the few dollars of chemicals that make up the structure of our bodies? Don't think that Decena's labor of love is some kind of docudrama, something that might appear on the Discovery Channel for the edification of searching minds. On the contrary, while a few scientific terms are bandied about by the attractive, primarily 20-something cast, "Dopamine" is every bit a romance, but without the artifices of Hollywood tripe like "Maid in Manhattan" and "Under the Tuscan Sun." The female lead, the somewhat androgynous but nonetheless charming Sabrina Lloyd, is nothing like Diane Lane or Catherine Zeta-Jones, but that's all to the good, given the picture's down-to-earth, no- nonsense conceits while allowing audience hearts to flutter.
On the one hand, we have the opinion of the fifty-something Tom (William Windom), father of Rand (John Livingston), who believes that love is nothing more than the sizzle if chemicals in the brain. Turn off the chemicals and that love is gone. No wonder he thinks so. Having fallen head over heels for the woman he married, he now faces a wife who is afflicted by Alzheimer's so severe that she sits immobile on the couch of their San Francisco home, fails even to turn to the sound of voices in the room, and is oblivious to what transpires about. Her own capacity to love has been shut down, but in addition her husband Tom, who is perfectly healthy, no longer feels the way he once did in any shape or form. Young Rand, a sweet, vulnerable computer programmer, gives his father's decrees considerable thought and is leaning toward the chemical view especially when he encounters a woman, Sarah, to whom he feels attracted but is convinced that her smell, her touch, her voice simply trigger the dopamine in his brain. If at some time in the future that dopamine is no longer triggered, then goodby love. No way will a woman fall for this hodge-podge theory: Sarah does not act kindly toward Rand's rigid view, but she is herself unable to establish a healthy connection to men because of a secret in her own life that evokes her guilt. Thus her bar- hopping, her smoking, and her commitment to teaching pre- school children.
Director Mark Decena, who was inspired to make this film because of events in his own life specifically, having discovered that the first smile he received from his newborn baby aroused the same euphoria in him as did the presence of his
wife cleverly cuts to quick, surreal shots depicting the electrical charges at work in Rand's brain when in the presence of Sarah. Adding considerable dimension is the relationship of Rand with his two associates of about the same age, the incredibly handsome Winston (Bruno Campost), smooth with the ladies but flawed by narcissism, and the most normal guy of the trio, Johnson (Rueben Grundy), whose view of the mystery of love is, "Why does it have to make sense?" A subplot dealing with the trio's attempts to sell a computer animation game to a Japanese firm adds to argument that attraction might just be an irrational impulse triggered by hormones.
"Dopamine" is an original: paced at an appropriately deliberate speed, certainly creative, while satisfying as not only a date movie but a work of honesty and intelligence that can be appreciated by mature moviegoers everywhere.
Rated R. 84 minutes.(c) 2003 by Harvey Karten at
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