Due West

by Rachel Willis

Director Evan Miller focuses his attention on a desperate Woman in his first feature film, Due West.

Co-writing with Hardy Janson, Miller opens the film by letting the camera rest on a solitary woman standing outside a quiet bar. This unnamed Woman (Adrianne Palicki) smokes, taps her foot nervously against the wall, and waits for a text that tells her she will need $700 by tomorrow.

It’s not much to go on, but it’s clear from the tension that bleeds from every gesture and expression from the Woman that this is a steep sum of money. And money she desperately needs.

It’s hard not to be hooked as we follow her from moment to moment. Even as two bar patrons shoot the shit with a female bartender, our gaze never strays from our protagonist for long. When she re-enters the bar, her anxious body language belies the smile on her face.

Though not explicitly stated, it’s easy to figure out why the Woman needs the money. The sum, the cryptic texts, and the command to text from a burner phone when she reaches her destination speak to a procedure recently made illegal in many states after a certain, damaging Supreme Court ruling.

The film’s dialogue, at times, is stunning. It brings with it snatches of backstory, life lived in a small town in West Texas, where the people know your business whether you want them to or not. Especially when you don’t want them to. Sadly, there are also times when it leaves subtlety behind – to the film’s detriment.

The second half of the film is when it starts to fall apart. Though our sympathy lies with the protagonist, as we learn more of her story, as she makes certain choices, judgment bleeds into the film. It ends up making a statement that there is a “right” type of situation when a certain procedure is justified. Whether intentional or not, it’s a harmful choice for a film to make when women deserve the right to care regardless of the why.