American Woman

Heist movies usually focus on the crime; road movies on the road. American Woman flicks at those genres, but its focus is somewhere else – on the relationships that develop in the liminal spaces between moments of intensity.

Clear-eyed and sharply written, it feels like a natural fit for the small screen, although it may be too quiet to make much of an impact on theatrical markets.

There’s little that’s memorable here and less to latch onto, beyond the foregrounding of an Asian woman in American history and Chau’s performance.

The film is lively and detailed enough so it is never boring, but it never takes off dramatically or realizes its intriguing possibilities either.

“American Woman” tries to give us a fresh angle on a familiar subject, but the film is listless and desultory. It sketches in the scuzzy power dynamics of these characters but fails, in most cases, to dramatize what made them tick.