Roy Scheider steals the show in If I Didn’t Care, and not only because he’s the foremost recognizable member of the cast. As the seasoned detective of a secluded Hamptons community, Scheider isn’t the centerpiece of this keen minimalist noir, but he’s the perfect choice for its moral heft. Building on the figure of social responsibility from Jaws, Scheider plays a similar character with an additional investigatory kick. The presence of an enjoyable random face (Scheider hasn’t been in anything memorable since David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch in 1991), relegated to a secondary role, often reveals the source of funding for low budget productions like If I Didn’t Care, but Scheider serves a more satisfying purpose. The plot revolves around one of those adulterer-turned-murderer schemes used a zillion times since Double Indemnity: Scheider is channeling Edward G. Robinson’s pensive insurance auditor from that seedy genre classic. In Jaws, Scheider portrayed a warrior guarding man from beast, not unlike his purpose in If I Didn’t Care. The shark in this tale is the dark impulse of human nature—a cliché, perhaps, but thematically daunting nonetheless.
Outside of the impressive supporting performance, the movie has much in common with Blood Simple. Just as that 1984 cult hit signaled the arrival of Joel and Ethan Coen as enthralling storytellers, If I Didn’t Care could work as a solid calling card for co-director siblings Ben and Orson Cummings. Although hardly as distinctly stylized as Blood Simple, their debut feature adheres to our expectations of the genre without becoming a bore. The main players go through the motions to establish anticipatory drama, and the filmmakers graciously satisfy our morbid curiosity.
Of course, the twist is visible long before it actually begins to gel. From the moment that hapless beau Davis (Bill Sage) laments that he can’t leave his icy business-oriented wife (Noelle Beck) for his secret lover (Susan Misner) without sacrificing the monetary benefits of his spouse’s profitable career, the stars are aligned for a familiar plan of attack. Davis and his deceitful paramour have such an easy time deciding to commit murder that you’d think they came to the conclusion after five minutes of Google abuse. Naturally, their conspiracy isn’t airtight, and the movie really takes off when things start going wrong. If I Didn’t Care doesn’t sympathize with its depraved protagonists. Instead, it allows us to rejoice in the guilty pleasure of watching a misguided ship of passion sink.
Of all the criminal scenarios enacted time and again with systematic redundancy, the devious love triangle remains the most endearing. Since the gimmick relies on the least expensive type of movie magic—acting—it has been sadly ignored in recent times by the production choices of the Hollywood machine. Big budget operations waste money on buying celebrity names and attaching them to less interesting formulas, particularly the whodunit, which usually turns into less a story than a guessing game. Consider I Know Who Killed Me, the poorly timed Lindsay Lohan-starrer that, on paper, sounds like an intriguing marriage of Hostel and Brian De Palma’s Sisters. Aside from the indisputable result that I Know Who Killed Me is unintentionally campy, clumsily staged, and hilariously, immeasurably awful in a sub-grindhouse way, it also spends a lamentably prolonged period of time dwelling on possible answers to its titular question. She knows whodunit, but nobody (least of all the audience) cares. The set up in If I Didn’t Care automatically transcends that narratological quagmire by putting the secrets onscreen and giving us the timeless pleasure of watching someone figure them out. Its finale feels a tad unnecessary and a bit hard to take, but it’s the journey, not the lethal finish, that keeps this immutable yarn alive.
Outside of the impressive supporting performance, the movie has much in common with Blood Simple. Just as that 1984 cult hit signaled the arrival of Joel and Ethan Coen as enthralling storytellers, If I Didn’t Care could work as a solid calling card for co-director siblings Ben and Orson Cummings. Although hardly as distinctly stylized as Blood Simple, their debut feature adheres to our expectations of the genre without becoming a bore. The main players go through the motions to establish anticipatory drama, and the filmmakers graciously satisfy our morbid curiosity.
Of course, the twist is visible long before it actually begins to gel. From the moment that hapless beau Davis (Bill Sage) laments that he can’t leave his icy business-oriented wife (Noelle Beck) for his secret lover (Susan Misner) without sacrificing the monetary benefits of his spouse’s profitable career, the stars are aligned for a familiar plan of attack. Davis and his deceitful paramour have such an easy time deciding to commit murder that you’d think they came to the conclusion after five minutes of Google abuse. Naturally, their conspiracy isn’t airtight, and the movie really takes off when things start going wrong. If I Didn’t Care doesn’t sympathize with its depraved protagonists. Instead, it allows us to rejoice in the guilty pleasure of watching a misguided ship of passion sink.
Of all the criminal scenarios enacted time and again with systematic redundancy, the devious love triangle remains the most endearing. Since the gimmick relies on the least expensive type of movie magic—acting—it has been sadly ignored in recent times by the production choices of the Hollywood machine. Big budget operations waste money on buying celebrity names and attaching them to less interesting formulas, particularly the whodunit, which usually turns into less a story than a guessing game. Consider I Know Who Killed Me, the poorly timed Lindsay Lohan-starrer that, on paper, sounds like an intriguing marriage of Hostel and Brian De Palma’s Sisters. Aside from the indisputable result that I Know Who Killed Me is unintentionally campy, clumsily staged, and hilariously, immeasurably awful in a sub-grindhouse way, it also spends a lamentably prolonged period of time dwelling on possible answers to its titular question. She knows whodunit, but nobody (least of all the audience) cares. The set up in If I Didn’t Care automatically transcends that narratological quagmire by putting the secrets onscreen and giving us the timeless pleasure of watching someone figure them out. Its finale feels a tad unnecessary and a bit hard to take, but it’s the journey, not the lethal finish, that keeps this immutable yarn alive.
