Choose Me

Love is a mysterious game for the players in Choose Me, writer-director Alan Rudolph's uniquely eccentric spin on matters of the heart. A comedic drama steeped in a nocturnal, smooth-jazz atmosphere, the production is rooted in the mid-1980s but laced with a timeless film noir attitude. Its chamber-piece characters collide and carom from one to the other, each interaction revealing clues about how passions either cloud or clarify our paths to romantic fulfillment. Mickey (Keith Carradine) isn't the pathological liar he's supposed to be; sex-talk radio host Nancy Love (Geneviève Bujold) uses an assumed name and knows far less about sex than she lets on; and bar owner Eve (Lesley Ann Warren) knows too much about men but not enough about love. When they meet and mingle, Rudolph (using Teddy Pendergrass songs as the perfect mood-setting soundtrack) orchestrates a passionate dance of sex, sadness, and self-discovery that's wittily observant and altogether beguiling. --Jeff Shannon