Anna Margaret Hollyman is the one compelling reason to see “Small, Beautifully Moving Parts,” a microbudget road movie about Sarah Sparks, a callow young woman who is pregnant and in search of answers to her own questions about the mothers who preceded her and their yet-to-be-communicated secrets. The peripatetic Sarah identifies herself as a “freelance technologist,” repairing technology defunct and nearly so, puttering and muttering. Hollyman is such a fleet, charming presence, quick to react and quicker to gleam, that it’s possible to read much more into the short-story-slim quality of writer-directors Lisa Robinson and Annie J. Howell’s storytelling. It’s doubly moving: the character makes discoveries, and Hollyman sparks them to unlikely life. Her eyes alone are bright magic. With Richard Hoag, Andre Holland, Sarah Rafferty, Mary Beth Peil. 73m. Shot in twenty-one days on the Canon 7D DSLR camera. (Ray Pride)
“Small Beautifully Moving Parts” opens Friday at Facets. A trailer is below.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
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