The in Between

Filmmaker Robie Flores returned to her hometown on the Texas/Mexico border after her brother's untimely death to make this quasi-documentary/coming-of-age memory film/portrait of a border town. This is one of those deeply personal docs people seem to love nowadays, but I found it alienatingly pleased with itself. At one point, Flores talks about looking for videos of her late brother because she can’t stand the idea of a generic slideshow playing at his funeral. Still photography can be so evocative and profound. Home videos strung together with ponderous narration are the opposite.