David's Hummer H2, the color of Pinot Noir, is large enough for two people to share a confined space and be worlds apart at the same time. He is in the California desert with his girlfriend Katia, scouting locations for we don't know what. They seem to have a lot of free time, so they have lots of sex, fight a lot, drive around, stay in motels, watch TV. When the action, what little there is, feels clumsy and pointless, it's not due to poor screen writing or acting or directing, but it's because life itself is pointless and clumsy. Mostly anyway. "29 Palms" is an honest and well-made movie, a fair rendition of a couple's roadside life. Stay away if you don't like foreign-language films: they speak mostly French, both in thick, ludicrous accents, his American, hers Russian. Vincent Gallo would love it. As I still ponder how David's deep red "Hartford Folk Festival" long-sleeve is a nice change from the fake Ramones T-Shirts everybody else is wearing these days, terror strikes. Not for the faint of heart. I mean it.

NB This is a review of the 2003 French movie by Bruno Dumont, not of the 2002 US movie by Leonardo Ricagni.