SUNDANCE 2020 FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW! From Jeff Baena and its star Alison Brie, Horse Girl is one of those films, where it’s just hard to come in cold. This review comes from a perspective of not knowing anything about the film, other than its stars and its title, and I just let it unfold. From that perspective, Horse Girl is a fascinating story of a loner and evolves into something unimaginable and unpredictable.
Alison Brie plays Sarah, the titular horse girl. Her day is spent working at a craft store during the day with Joan (Molly Shannon) and then going home to her apartment with her roommate, Nikki (Debby Ryan). On occasion, Sarah goes to a nearby stable, where she helps with the everyday chores and gets to see her former horse, now owned by another young girl.
“…a fascinating story of a loner and evolves into something unimaginable and unpredictable.”
Sarah is established as a loner. She wants to get out and meet people but is just as happy staying home and watching a popular vampire drama on television. Being the good roommate, Nikki starts to push Sarah into hanging out with her and her boyfriend. As it is Sarah’s birthday, Nikki invites nice guy Darren (John Reynolds) over and the two hit it off. Nice start, right?
It is at this point when Sarah’s good fortune begins to trigger off a series of events. We find out that Sarah sleepwalks. She has dreams of herself in a brightly lit, white room with two strangers lying next to her. Sarah then goes to her mother’s gravesite and then visits a few oddly familiar places. The next morning, she wakes up to find she abandoned her car and needs help from her step-father Gary (Paul Reiser) to help her get the car back. Soon everything in Sarah’s life spins out of control when she sees the man in her dreams and begins inserting herself into his life to figure out the dream’s meaning.
"…more like a cinematic experience than it is a neat and tidy story..."
