Written by Peter Genoway
Directed by Cody Calahan
Starring RJ Mitte, Peter Outerbridge and Ari Millen
Running time: 1 hour and 30 minutes
Unrated-contains salty language, violence both explicit and implied and emotionally upsetting formative childhood recollections

by Hunter Bush

There’s a lot happening in the margins of Cody Calahan’s nested-narrative thriller The Oak Room. For a film with a story tucked inside a story inside a story, a lot goes unstated but while some details never quite coalesce, enough becomes clear for us to infer the shape of things. Adapted by Peter Genoway from his own stage play, on its face The Oak Room is the story of two men in a bar talking about two other men in a different bar, but what it’s really talking about is the power and nature of stories.

The film opens with Paul (Peter Outerbridge) *just about* to close up his bar, The Pool Room, for the night when, in out of the snowy blizzard comes Steve (RJ Mitte), the son of Paul’s best friend. Thing is, Steve hasn’t been home in three years, not even for his own father’s funeral, leaving Paul to pay for everything out of a sense of camaraderie, which means Steve has a debt to settle. Steve, who admits to just “drifting” since failing out of college doesn’t have anything like the money to pay off his debt, but he does have ...a story. A story he thinks may be of interest to Paul.

If you’ve read Moviejawn’s pre-Fantasia Fest 2020 round-up, you may recall I was quite excited for the small-town true-crime aspect of The Oak Room, but that its frequent use of the word “story” in the trailer meant I would be paying special attention to that thread and how that implied importance tied into the film’s themes. The bad news is: I don’t think there’s a real clear through-line regarding the importance of Story. The good news however, is: I still think the film is pretty solid.

The story Steve recounts is a somewhat familiar one - a man coming in out of a snowstorm shortly before a bar, the titular Oak Room this time, is about to close - but is heavy with tension, mystery, mistaken identity, violence and an element of voyeurism. When it’s over, the Oak Room’s bartender is dead and the implication is that he wasn’t the correct, intended victim. The tale unfurls in a nonlinear form, with Steve starting near the end and circling back before ultimately saying he “forgot the best part” and dropping an apparently extremely sobering knowledge bomb on Paul.

“A story’s got no value. Can I pay for a new fridge with a story?” Paul needles Steve early in their uneasy reunion. Even if I hadn’t seen the trailer, this line would stick out to me like a sore thumb because I, as a member of the audience, know that this is a *film* which is a story being told by a team of storytellers/filmmakers. Any time a work of creative art talks about the value of story, my ears prick up because I know we’re dancing around capital-T Theme territory. So what does The Oak Room ultimately say about the value of Story?

I’m not going to be able to really address this issue without giving away some minor points about The Oak Room’s finale, so if you are absolutely terminally spoilophobic, skip to the last paragraph. The way things wrap up, it seems clear that the bartender at the Oak Room was killed over a debt of some kind - the killer (Ari Millen) says “Jimmy Thompson (*) sends his regards” before delivering the killing blow - but that, due to the bad weather and the overall similarities between The Oak Room and The Pool Room, the killer has ended up in the wrong bar. Paul blanches at this, the implication being that the name “Jimmy Thompson” means something to him, if not us (*). The thematic keynote as I see it is that stories, or at least this one, indeed have value to Paul and - had he let Steve tell his story straight through, uninterrupted - this one could even have saved his life. Unfortunately I don’t think this moral lands very well.

(*) - Everybody in this has Average Joe names and it was driving me nuts. No offense to the Steves, Pauls or Michaels of the world but when all the characters are essentially the same - smalltown barflys - these monikers aren’t helping me keep them straight in my head.

RJ Mitte, playing Steve, delivers the story-full-of-stories with a certain sinister undertone, like he always knows more than he’s letting on which robs that final thematic beat of some of its impact. If Mitte had played Steve as just some shlubb finally rolling back into town with no ulterior motive, then Paul constantly delaying the telling of a story that might save his life would play like a tragedy, filled with dramatic irony. As it is, Steve has weaponized a Story for some kind of revenge (which I should add, we are given no indication he deserves). The implication then is that something can only have value if it directly benefits us or can be weaponized, which I don’t agree with in the slightest.

That thematic stumble aside, The Oak Room is an incredibly solidly-built thriller mystery that wouldn’t feel out of place next to the morality tales from something like Tales From the Crypt (high praise from me, I assure you). The performances are all very good, even though some of them don’t reveal their full quality until you view them in hindsight - I found myself repeatedly wondering why characters were acting the way(s) they were and it wouldn’t become clear until much later - even Mitte’s aforementioned “Aw, shucks!” menace is a good performance on its own despite it clashing with my interpretation of the themes. Director Cody Calahan (along with cinematographer Jeff Maher) drench almost every frame in deep shadows and warmth - no coincidence that warmth and darkness are the qualities of an inviting dive bar - in a way that reminded me of the opening of some high profile crime series’ you’d see on HBO or Netflix. The score - music by Steph Copeland - which is admittedly sparse, works incredibly well to bolster the moments where it makes itself known.

The Oak Room, much like the bars it depicts, is a good place to spend a few hours even if you won’t be leaving with much more than a good story.

Catch a live virtual screening during the Fantasia Festival on Monday, August 31st at 11:30 PM.