By David Dent
Anthology, or portmanteau movies, are tricky beasts. The original format of these movies – a number of short stories with a wraparound idea (usually some form of host) – has largely been ditched these days in favour of features which cobble together preexisting short films.
The Driftless harks back to the golden age of the portmanteau film by having a character introduce each of the three (well three main and one smaller) stories, using a rather nifty setup; Antique Al (Torrey Hanson) runs an curios and oddities shop somewhere in the Midwest of America. It’s the kind of place where you lose yourself in all manner of weirdness. Al pitches his prices according to need or, conversely, whether people deserve to be fleeced; he’s been around for a while and knows the area, so for a tip, he’ll pull the shutters down and tell you a tale linked to the item you purchased.
This is such a great idea, but, like pretty much every anthology film, the short stories within are a decidedly mixed bag. In ‘Papa Bait’, the most successful, a couple find out exactly what goes into make the local fish lure when they come across a masked guy with murder on his mind; in ‘Booze’ (a rather extended section), a washed up musician locks himself away, with a crate of alcohol, to rediscover his songwriting mojo or face death; and in ‘The Pool Keeper’ a young boy comes across an enigmatic cleaner in a remote motel, and gets the chance to alter his fate. There’s also a rather unsuccessful framing story involving a dead woman and a spade.
The Driftless looks great, and the whole thing is put together really well; when it works, the movie is very watchable, but there aren’t that many moments like that, and more often than not the narrative is too confusing to satisfy. It’s not a bad film in any way, but with stronger stories and a tighter edit, if could have been fantastic..
The Driftless screened as part of Grimmfest 2025.
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