Grade: B | Genre: Independent Summary: This film, like all of Todd Solondz' films, is filled with cynicism, absurdity, human despair, bad clothes, and biting humor. It may not be his masterpiece, but it's a meaty, satisfying chunk of celluloid from one the current Master Chefs of the cinema. Todd Solondz has enjoyed some notoriety over the years as a director who delights in revealing middle class America, warts and all to an unsuspecting public. Palindromes, his latest trek into dangerous waters is certainly filled with moments that will leave you aghast or choking on your popcorn, but it is hardly his best work. As somewhat of an extension of his 1995 cult classic, Welcome To The Dollhouse, Palindromes shares that films adolescent theme of growing up in a world full of unfairness, cruelty and bizarre circumstances. On the other hand, Palindromes is nothing like Dawn Wiener's tale of teenage travails. It may start off with her untimely funeral, but from there, the story veers off into the unknown.

We follow little Aviva from pre-adolescence as she dreams of having lots of babies to love her. Could it be that she feels unloved by her mediocre parents (played with stark sincerity by Richard Masur and Ellen Barkin)? It's hard to say, as little Aviva rarely vocalizes her feelings to grown-ups.

After a supposedly innocent visit to friends of the family, Aviva becomes pregnant by their son and is strong-armed into getting an abortion. Barkin's kitchen table speech about her own experience with an unwanted pregnancy is just one more example of Solondz's ability to show how absurd people sound when they are trying to be serious.

Palindromes Starring: Ellen Barkin, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Emani Sledge & Valerie Shusterov Director: Todd Solondz View the Trailer (Quicktime) Related Articles Me and You and Everyone We Know I Heart Huckabees

Eventually Aviva runs away from home and stows away in a semi-trailer being driven by a man who calls himself Joe, and then Earl. Later we find out his real name is Bob. Be that as it may, they sleep together in a cheap hotel and Joe/Earl/Bob leaves Aviva in the dust. So she sets off again to be discovered by a little boy named Peter Paul.

This is where the film gathers steam and begins to take shape as something other than a bizarre road movie. Peter Paul takes Aviva, played now by Sharon Wilkins the black woman of the film's poster and introduces her to Mama Sunshine. She then meets husband Bo, and their family of foundlings, lost children who have been emotionally aborted by their so-called loved ones. Regardless, they are all as cheerful as the moniker they sing under, "The Sunshine Singers," and for a brief time, Aviva has a happy, loving home to share.

Fate brings her back into contact with Joe/Earl/Bob while she is practicing with the rest of the Sunshine Singers. It isn't long before Aviva takes off with Joe/Earl/Bob who, in his pitiable existence, she has somehow come to love. They take off across country to exact revenge on the doctor who gave Aviva her abortion. Once again, things go awry. Stephen Adly Guirgis, who plays Joe/Earl/Bob with unforgettable pathos in his first big screen role, delivers one of the best lines in the film. In a moment of black despair he cries out, "Oh God! How many times can I be born again?" It's a line worthy of John Waters at his most vitriolic.

How this story eventually plays out, with sudden shifts to the left or right calculated to jar the viewers into recognition of the crazy world around them seems to be part of the director's intention. It's like Solondz is shaking us to snap out of it so we can see the banal mess our country has become.

There are no easy answers here, and certainly no happy endings, at least by any commercial standard. Things happen. Mistakes are made. People get hurt. But their pain and suffering, the pathetic details of their world, are object lessons that bring uncomfortable laughter.

When the chuckles have subsided, we are left to ponder the events we have just witnessed. What is this society we are born into? How can we know ourselves in such a prefabricated world? Where is the path that will lead to happiness?

If you do not like asking yourself such difficult questions, perhaps this film is not for you. Perhaps Dawn's brother Mark, (Matthew Faber reprising his creepy role in Welcome To The Dollhouse) sums up the story's angst as he attempts to clear himself of pedophilic accusations. "People think they change, but they don't."

This film, like all of Todd Solondz' films, is filled with cynicism, absurdity, human despair, bad clothes, and biting humor. It may not be his masterpiece, but it's a meaty, satisfying chunk of celluloid from one the current Master Chefs of the cinema.