Most of us have done something we regret.
Some of us, if we're being honest, have done many somethings we regret.
Lloyd Hayek (Robert Blanche, Grimm, Medium) has done so many somethings in his life that his daughter, Iris (Bethany Jacobs, Grimm, The Drunk Show), was forced to grow up without him as he spent years upon years in prison. She's an adult now, married to a police officer named Bobby (Grant Davis, Grimm, Combat Report) and has a marriage that seems like it should be idyllic but we get the feeling rather early in the film that it's not.
We're right.
Lloyd gets released from prison, of course, and becomes determined to somehow make amends with Iris, though she's initially more than a little resistant to his unneeded and unwelcome return to her life.
But, there's Bobby. Things with Bobby are getting worse and Lloyd, determined to become the father he's never been, re-enters Iris's life at what may very well be the worst time possible for a guy who's spent the last 20+ years in prison and is trying hard as hell to not go back. But, then again...sometimes, you gotta' do whatever you gotta' do for those you love.
Tomorrow, Maybe had its world premiere at Dances With Films and has picked up a handful of prizes in the Portland Indie Film Awards including Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor. Indeed, they are all well deserved.
Tomorrow, Maybe is a riveting drama partly because of its involving script yet, perhaps more than anything, because director Jace Daniel has cast this film nearly flawlessly.
Robert Blanche is absolutely riveting as Lloyd, a revelatory combination of wounded vulnerability, protective father and an almost childlike hopefulness that makes you root for him even knowing that he's created almost every challenge he faces along the way.
The film's emotional core may very well belong to Bethany Jacobs for a turn as Iris that possesses both hardened ache and an almost permanent defensive posture that comes courtesy of an undeserved life where nearly every single person who should have loved her hasn't done so. Jacobs is simply wonderful here, painfully so, but simply wonderful.
As the cop with abusive tendencies, Grant Davis portrays quite powerfully the ins and outs, ups and downs of the abusive cycle and, in a rather insightful way, plays Bobby as precisely the kind of spouse that a wife would go back to again and again despite, on some level, knowing better. Davis's is an intelligent, thoughtful performance that is even more impactful precisely because he doesn't necessarily turn Bobby into the monster we might expect.
Daniel's instincts as a filmmaker are spot on here and he constructs the film effectively and powerfully with an ending that resonates as emotionally and practically honest to everything that has unfolded before it. Bravo.
Tomorrow, Maybe is the kind of film that lingers and sloshes around your brain, its words and images just as powerful days after watching the film as they were while you were sitting in front of the screen. It's a familiar film, perhaps, but it's a beautifully realized film and it's a film that should stick around on the indie fest circuit for quite awhile.
© Written by Richard Propes
The Independent Critic
