Directing: A
Acting: A-
Writing: A-
Cinematography: B+
Editing: A

I loved this movie. It surprises and delights on nearly all fronts—and I came into it with some slight trepidation. Miranda July, after all, has made a career out of self-indulgently “quirky” projects. That said, I guess I didn’t quite recall how I hadn’t thought her past work was all that great. Her 2005 feature directorial debut, You And Me And Everyone We Know, was all right, though it did offer the now-immortal line in cinema: “You poop into my butt hole and I poop into your butt hole, back and forth, forever.” July’s 2011 follow-up, The Future, was decidedly . . . not as good.

It’s been nine years since then. Miranda July has worked on other things in the interim, but not directing a feature film. I’m tempted to say she took her time to arrive at her masterpiece. Could she possibly top Kajillionaire? Maybe. But if she does, I will be stunned. I’d be happy to call this film her crowning achievement.

And that is in spite of its own “quirkiness.” And make no mistake: this film’s characters have plenty of quirks, and it long ago became a pet peeve of mine to see independent films overly enamored with their own quirkiness, with every single one of its characters pointedly not behaving in any normal human way. Think, say, Napoleon Dynamite, an overrated “quirky movie” if there ever was one.

There’s a key difference this time, though. Kajillinaire has only three overly quirky characters, all of them played spectacularly by Richard Jenkins and Debra Winger as the parents, and Evan Rachel Wood as “Old Dolio,” named by her weirdo criminal parents after a homeless man they once knew. Old Dolio has no sense of human tenderness, because neither do her parents, who never demonstrated it for her. And Wood plays her so well, it took me a while before I realized I was watching one of the stars of Westworld.

She and her family live in a rented storage unit next to a business called “Bubbles, Inc,” which leaks foamy bubbles from the top of one of their unit’s walls, making for some memorable imagery as they gather bubbles in garbage buckets at intervals so regular they all have their watches synchronized to it. They are a family of con artists. In the opening scene, Old Dolio is sent into a room of post office boxes where she reaches in far enough to steal packages out of neighboring boxes.

Perhaps what I love most about Kajillionaire is how everything circles around and reveals itself to have a purpose, even the seemingly quirky stuff at the start. This movie starts off by fooling you into thinking it’s just like all the other self-consciously odd indie movies, and then stealthily reveals itself to be something with so much heart, it almost blindsides you with how moving it is. This applies to something even as strange as the choreographed dance in which Old Dolio sneaks into that post office in the opening scene, later performed again in someone’s living room.

Living rooms play a key role in this story. This family of three, in the middle of yet another scam that involves flying to New York and back, meets a young Puerto Rican woman on the plane back, and invite her in on their schemes—upending Old Dolio’s sensually repressed life in the process. Gina Rodriguez, as this outsider, is a stark contrast to the scammer family. She’s a principal character who actually behaves like a normal person. Virtually everyone does in this movie aside from Old Dolio and her parents, but it’s Melanie who teaches Old Dolio what it looks like to be genuine and sincere and kind.

And there is so much more to Kajillionaire, I’m just not doing it justice. It just has to be seen. And I was so taken with it, this was the first movie since the pandemic started to make me really, truly wish I could have seen what I was watching in a movie theater. And this isn’t even some special effects blockbuster extravaganza. But it is a movie that very much lends itself to a communal watching experience. It has so much to unpack, with its use of one family to represent Baby Boomers and Millennials and what they have given and taken from each other. It’s a text so rich with meaning and depth, I’m already eager to watch it again.

In select theaters now; on demand October 16.

*Who needs love and tenderness when there’s cash to grab.?*

Overall: A-