Editorial Note: This review contains spoilers.

“In vino veritas” means “there is truth in wine.” And sometimes, there is. The rest of the time, wine — or any alcohol, for that matter — leads to bluster, empty impulsivity, and posturing.

The wine in the film Vino Veritas, however, is supposed to be different. It’s a truth serum. Made from the skin of poisonous blue dart frogs, it’s consumed by forest-dwelling folks in Peru on their wedding nights, coaxing candor out of the bride and groom to help them decide whether a lifelong commitment is really a good idea. In a moment of daring, it’s also imbibed by three of the four characters featured in Vino Veritas, spurring a messy Halloween of unwelcome admissions and soggy emotional baggage. And this is the essence of the film: a story about the fruits and liabilities of absolute honesty.

By the way, “honesty” in this case generally means obstinate cynicism and unremitting unpleasantness. If I had to shack up with any of these people for an evening of full disclosure in the Peruvian jungle, the wedding would be off.

First there’s the exasperated and exasperating Lauren (Heather Raffo) whose insatiable appetite for “adventure” makes her sound like an eight-year-old stuck in timeout. Her husband, Phil (Brian Hutchison), is a cloying dope who likes to throw rocks at the neighbor’s kid. Then there’s Claire (Carrie Preston, True Blood and The Good Wife), the repressed housewife who can’t hold her frog-wine as well as the others, and whose unhindered self isn’t half as wild as she is obnoxious. Claire’s husband, Ridley (Bernard White), is the only one who resists the wine, securing his role as the voice of conventional society in all its dishonesty.

Originally written for the stage, Vino Veritas makes a reasonably smooth transition to the screen. The production value is surprisingly high for an independent film funded (at least partially) with donations, and the cast does an admirable job considering the natural constraints of a theatre-to-film feature (a static environment, long-winded dialogue, etc.). Director Sarah Knight’s career in film spans two decades and includes the direction of two recent documentaries — Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend and Hot Flash — the latter of which secured the Audience Favorite Award at the 2009 Cinema on the Bayou Festival. Her other efforts include three short films — Qiana, Abstinence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder, and Survivor in ‘da Hood — as well as an adaption of the 1987 novel A Yellow Raft in Blue Water.

The problem with Vino Veritas isn’t its direction, which is executed ably enough. Rather, it’s David MacGregor’s story. MacGregor has written five plays (including Vino Veritas) and seven other screenplays. Given the amount of stage time his work has received in the United States and London, one would hope Vino Veritas isn’t a representative example. The dialogue is often overbearing and the revelations that drive the story somehow manage to be both repellent and stale.

First, a technical point: the magic wine functions almost exactly like regular wine. It makes you quick-tempered and quarrelsome. It makes you unbelievably annoying. And it certainly doesn’t force you to disclose things against your will, evidenced by Phil’s unwillingness to comment on one of Claire’s shrill, irritating rants (this one is about the myriad of psychological issues that plague Winnie the Pooh characters). A quick aside — it’s a strain to believe Claire actually takes such vehement issue with the cartoons, and her tirade fights unduly hard for the handful of smirks it might elicit.

Claire is the only one who enthusiastically shares as much as she can — like her surprising sexual proclivities (she likes bondage) and the way she feels about Ridley’s mother. She also adopts a completely different set of idiosyncrasies and frequently says things as callously as possible, effects that aren’t present in the others. This lack of consistency is troublesome. If the wine has different effects on different people and can’t cause involuntary confessions, doesn’t that sap some of the fun from the premise? The characters are still exercising their best judgment and restraining themselves.

When the facts start pouring out — and they sort of do — you’ll be eagerly awaiting the climax. Sadly, it never comes. Phil once threw a rock at a neighbor boy. Lauren is — gasp — an atheist. Lauren and Phil only attend church to poach customers for their photography business. Here’s a quick reminder: we don’t live in the 18th century, so there’s nothing exotic about atheism.

It’s clear that Lauren and Phil are the honest couple, willing to face the unvarnished reality of life — and they’re stronger for it; Claire and Ridley, on the other hand, “have to return to their shining past or they won’t have a future.” This manifests itself in their respective comments on religion — Lauren and Phil don’t need the solace of faith, while Claire and Ridley can’t picture life without it.

This would have been a reasonable analogy, but MacGregor’s ill-fitting commentary on September 11 is as weird as it is vacuous. First, Lauren announces, “It’s not that big a deal.” When Ridley argues that it “changed everything,” Lauren calls his observation a “slogan…right up there with ‘have it your way,’ ‘this Bud’s for you,’ ‘just do it.’” You could call Ridley’s line hackneyed, sure, but how is it an attempt to sell you something? Her dramatic, final disclosure about a “day that [actually] changed everything” is a story about her abortion.

Three things about this dichotomy were cringe-worthy. First, it’s not naïve — and certainly not somehow commercial — to feel a sense of national solidarity when 3,000 of your compatriots are wantonly slain by religious madmen. The director proclaims that Vino Veritas “uncovers…cultural delusions that we cling to so doggedly in the hope that we can pass for a well-adjusted spouse, parent, and citizen.” Perhaps shared meaning and collective resistance to evil are among our “cultural delusions.” Second, the capacity to feel empathy across borders and demographics isn’t immature or disingenuous — on the contrary, it’s logical and the world needs more of it (see: Peter Singer’s “Drowning Child” thought experiment). Lauren seems to think the provincial should always outweigh the universal. Third and finally, an abortion is not a scandal. The film shouldn’t have treated it like one. You may argue that Ridley’s positions are counterweights to Lauren’s, placing the film upon firm middle-ground. But this doesn’t really hold up. If you’ll recall, Ridley is the only one who didn’t drink the wine. He’s still lying to himself and everyone else. Claire and Phil, on the other hand, are subordinate to their spouses and relatively ambivalent about the issues being discussed.

And yes, these are the sordid opinions of characters, so they aren’t necessarily consonant with those of the filmmakers. But viewers will be left in little doubt as to who is portrayed as the most venerable: Lauren. Even Knight admits, “I was particularly taken with the character of Lauren.” When a film’s director calls it “…a movie with substance, a movie that makes you think,” while brazenly claiming, “It reveals not only the characters and their world, but ideally, reveals the audience to itself,” you expect a lot more than this. Perhaps some audiences will see themselves in these characters. I’d be sorry to hear it.

Still, Vino Veritas can be fun, and good lines sometimes bubble up to the surface. Phil’s doltishness is always believable, frequently funny, and sometimes even poignant. Right after he realizes that Lauren is losing interest in him (he’s no longer “adventurous” enough for her), their friends show up and he has to don his cowboy costume. The juxtaposition between his jaunty cowboy demeanor and a disillusioned, almost disgusted Lauren is genuinely sad — when he playfully tells her to put her costume on, she makes a joke about castrating him. Visibly wounded by the remark, he says, “Okay! That’ll take the bang outta your six-shooter.” The sequence is oddly affecting, especially thanks to Phil’s facial expression. When the foursome is discussing how they’d like to die, Lauren says, “When I am gone, when everything I am is just completely obliterated, I want to leave a glow” — like fireflies she’d struck in her car. Phil replies, “Yep. She wants to be a smudge on God’s windshield.” Unfortunately, scenes like this are the exception rather than the norm.

All of the actors assume their roles with great care and talent. Claire is clearly teetering on the edge of desperation — and Preston’s quirkiness and energy (as someone temporarily liberated from a domineering husband) sustain the performance. A palpable sense of incredulity and exasperation undergird White’s representation of Ridley, and the quality of Hutchison’s performance is captured above. Raffo is appropriately sharp and smug as the ultra-frank Lauren, and any faults in her performance are due to a complete over-saturation of dialogue (for example, one raucous exchange between her and Phil shouldn’t have come anywhere near the beginning of the film, nor should it have been half as long). All of this is made doubly impressive by the oppressive shooting schedule — only 12 days!

Unfortunately, fine performances aren’t enough to wrench Vino Veritas from the vice of sub-mediocrity. If you want to watch a bunch of drunken people hurl insults at one another, spout insipid babble, and try to navigate the moist valleys of their floundering relationships, go to a party. That way, at least you’ll be drunk, too.

Rating: 1.5 out of 4 stars

“Vino Veritas” is currently available to watch on iTunes and various VOD platforms. For a complete list, please visit http://vinoveritasmovie.com/.

Video Courtesy of: Vino Veritas The Movie.

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Featured image: Carrie Preston as Claire in “Vino Veritas.” Photo Courtesy of: Jo Films.