Tommy Craven | Rivers & Parking Lots / 2014

the interruptive mother

by Douglas Messerli

 

Tommy Craven (screenwriter and director) Rivers & Parking Lots / 2014 [17 minutes]

 

Despite the title, there are neither rivers or parking lots portrayed in this film, but it might have been more interesting if there had been, maybe the places where the star of this poorly conceived project might have had sex with his so-called abuser as a child.

     The real abuser, in this case, appears to be his mother, who calls him endlessly, seeming to reporting information about child abusers—perhaps the very one who abused our hero, Dean (Tommy Craven).

     Yet, he isn’t even sure that he wants to describe the man with whom he had sex as an abuser, since he helped him come out and partially turned him into the young city boy he now is. But just what kind of life Dear is now living suggests that he is, himself, terribly self-abusive, perhaps as a psychological response.

   Not only does Dean constantly interrupt all his activities answering calls to his mother, he seems to not have any sense of self-worth in his relationships with other men. In the very first scene, he is showering when the doorbell rings. Eventually, he puts on a towel and greets the caller, who immediately gives him a quick kiss, enters, and begins to strip.

     Before they can even get in another kiss, Dean’s mother again calls, our “hero” receiving the call even while his Grindr lover goes down on him. When he finally hangs up, he is quickly fucked by his gentleman caller, who just as quickly dresses, and runs off.

     At another point, as Dean walks what appear to be the New York streets, he runs into an old friend (Sanjana Sinha) who invites him to a party, which he is not at all sure he wants to attend. She, along with her friends, insist he must join them and “catch up.” But he spends the entire evening on his cellphone, scrolling through Grindr faces or perhaps tracing further information about his childhood abuser provided by his mother.

     When one of the guests at the party, attempts to make sexual contact with him in the bathroom, he runs off only to be picked up by another young man, Adam, on the street (Jovani Zambrano) who finally turns out to be someone with whom he might really want to develop a relationship.

      But our confused central character suddenly is convinced that he wants to return to his hometown, perhaps as his new friend hints, to actually confront his former abuser. At least, his Adam seems to project some positive elements that seem to be utterly missing in our hero’s life. Yet, the stranger explains that he soon will be leaving town for some time, suggesting there is no way out for our young man to start up a new relationship.

     Dean returns home, takes another shower, and sings the song that he shared through his apps with Adam. It does not appear he’ll return home; but neither does it appear that our young boy has figured out want he truly wants out of life.

     There are some momentarily pretty images that really have nothing to do with the story, but the sound in this film is so awful that you want to turn it off, even with the hokey music score by Lucas Hamren.

     If only screenwriter and director Craven had some idea of what he was trying to say, this film might have had some redeeming qualities; if it could explain, as it appears it wants to, the effects of childhood sexual abuse. I admire it for not turning that long ago event into another scree about the effects of such abuse, and I salute its attempt to maintain the confusion the hero still feels about events. But clearly something has happened to make him incapable to fully operating as a human being, and we never get to the heart of what that problem is. I suggest it really has to do with his endlessly domineering mother more than the man with whom he had sex. If only he could have hung up on mom and take the handsome, caring and engaging Adam he met on the street to bed, everything might have turned out alright. But all we get is another shower, another attempt to wash the past away without perceiving where the future might take him. If nothing else, it’s clear that returning home is not the answer. Dean needs of move on. He should have Adam answer the call from his mother, as Adam joked he might do just to silence that damn cellphone throb.

 

Los Angeles, April 18, 2026 | Reprinted from M y Queer Cinema blog (April 2026).