The Liquid Moon
The only other work I’ve seen by Green was the mid-80s hit comedy Hamburger Twins, an amusing but not particularly perceptive work about a serious actor thrown into an identity crisis when he strikes it rich playing a talking hamburger in fast-food commercials. Yet here Green provides enough psychological meat to feed an audience for a week.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Ryan’s love interest adds another perspective through oblique comments early on and in a late scene when she insists on speaking her mind and analyzing her relationship with him. As played by Carrie Layne, Kelly at first appears very much a Hollywood-style sex kitten: meeting Ryan after a bookstore reading, she gushes and flatters and flirts. But Green makes clear what is not obvious in films like 10, that we’re mostly seeing Kelly through Ryan’s eyes. This is hardly a revolutionary insight, but one that in real life can take years of analysis to achieve. Later, when Ryan finally sees the wounded woman behind the sexy persona, we do too.
