The Killing of Two Lovers: Review. By Ayrton-Lewis Avery.

Imagine a movie about a man who keeps on running. That is The Killing of Two Lovers. The director was clearly rushing when he shot the entire film in only twelve days in a rural Utah town. The film considers the failure of a couple’s open relationship. Unlike most movies about family and love, this movie is not soothing or moralizing: instead, it is gritty and painful. Written and produced by the independent film director Robert Machoian, the plot is fast-paced as the character’s lives unravel more and more senselessly.

The movie follows a husband in an estranged and failing marriage. David, played by Clayne Crawford, is distraught over his wife, played by Sepideh Moaf, who has been cheating on him for some time now. Despite the couple’s relationship seeming amicable (although platonic), David repeatedly considers killing his wife and her lover (played by Chris Coy). David’s only comforts are his divorced father and his family of four. But he has a lot to grapple with, as the marriage is causing his whole life to fall apart. His daughter Jess, played by Avery Pizzuto, is shattered and shaken by her parent’s separation.

Towards the end, Jess suffers breakdown after breakdown. It becomes increasingly clear that the failing relationship is taking its toll on their children, and David, either out of desperation or out of madness, repeatedly blames his wife. He stops thinking rationally as he keeps on driving in circles around the town, contemplating his future. It seems like his long, emotional journey may never end. Eventually, David chooses his children over his wife, but not after he makes plenty of mistakes and experiences every level of turmoil.

The entire time, the spotlight is on one haggard, bearded man: David. He is passionate about only one thing: his family. Yet he fears facing his own passions. From the first scene, he is running: running away from his passions, until they trap him in a corner. Then he gets into his pickup truck. There he stays the entire time, sometimes chasing, sometimes fleeing, but never looking back until the very end. As the acting becomes more jerky, and the beard more unkempt, the struggle for his family becomes a struggle for David’s very livelihood. Probably because he has no one else. 

The movie makes us want to empathize with him. It is sad, but not teary. Crawford plays a convincing protagonist. David may seem weak, obsessive, and insane, but he, in fact, behaves just like the rest of us: he is a family man, possessive, unremarkable in his strength. The film’s moral and story is full of ambiguities. Maybe he tried too hard, and he was running a little too fast. Or maybe he did not try hard enough, and his demons caught up with him too soon.

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