Rent Trust (1990)

Deadpan Hearts, Late Payoff - Trust review by griggs

I kept admiring this more than I was enjoying it. Hal Hartley’s deadpan rhythms and stop-start plotting have that early-’90s indie confidence, but they can also feel like a clock with a dying battery: you’re aware of the ticking, less sure of the when.  

When it locks in, though, it really works. The love story between Martin Donovan and Adrienne Shelly is the film’s beating heart — quiet, sincere, and oddly tender beneath the flat delivery. You can sense a deeper emotional current even when the dialogue is doing its best impression of a philosophy lecture in a laundrette.

The rest wobbled for me: some character turns felt performed at the camera rather than lived in. Then the final ten minutes arrive and suddenly the pieces snap into focus. I left thinking: there’s a better film hiding inside this one, and it only fully shows itself right at the end.