The Unbelievable Truth

Josh comes out of prison and returns to the town where he was born. He wears black, says little, and everyone in town thinks they know who he is and what he did; but the stories do not match. He finds work at a garage. Audry lives in the same town: she does not want to go to university, believes nuclear war is close, and is offered work as a model. The two meet. Hal Hartley writes and directs. Robert Burke plays Josh and Adrienne Shelly plays Audry. It is his first feature and was made for very little money. The manner establishes a known strand of nineties American independent cinema: lines read flat, unemotional playing, fixed frames and strange timing. Hartley kept that manner in his later films. The subject is gossip. What is said about Josh is a murder story at the start, something else in the middle and something else again at the end; each time the town believes its own account. Audry is the engine of the narrative and stands outside the young woman type of independent film of the period. Adrienne Shelly became known with this film and made several more with Hartley. Who it is for: viewers who like nineties American independent cinema and dialogue driven comedy. Who it is not for: the acting is deliberately artificial, the narrative is loose, and the film stays cold for a viewer who does not take to the style.