Female Film Critics 24/375
Tow is inspired by a true story. Academy Award nominee, Rose Byrne plays Amanda Ogle, a woman who became homeless and forced to live in her car after a few wrong turns in life thrust her into poverty. When her only means of support is taken she loses all trust in herself. But she doesn’t give up and that’s what Tow is all about. Even if you tow the line and try to do the right thing, bureaucracy swallows you up.
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A day after watching Tow, Stephanie Laing’s gut-puncher of a film, I’m still outraged about two things: 1) The never-should-have-happened true story that inspired the movie and 2) the fact that Rose Byrne remains so underrated despite an Oscar nomination. Tow could easily fix both of those. The movie starts by sharing the staggering statistic that there are between one and three million vehicular residents in the United States. That means that millions of people are sleeping in their cars every single night. Amanda Ogle (Byrne) is one of them. Tow is a David and Goliath story and it’s impossible not to root for underdog Amanda, especially when Byrne makes her so real and so empathetic.
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A 1991 Toyota Camry is easy to dismiss, much like its owner in Tow, a star-studded David and Goliath story about homelessness that unfortunately spins its wheels in spots. Based on a true story, the film sees Amanda (Rose Byrne, Physical) living out of the car in Seattle while she hunts for a job as a veterinary technician. During one of her job interviews, someone steals the Toyota, which winds up on a private towing lot.
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In a pandemic-weary world where pretty much everyone is suffering from Zoom fatigue, it’s notable that Stephanie Laing’s Family Squares makes the experience of watching people interact via little boxes on one another’s computer screens both entertaining and genuinely engaging. It helps, of course, that they’re played by the likes of Ann Dowd, June Squibb, Henry Winkler, Margo Martindale, and Judy Greer — if only all virtual gatherings could be so star-studded!
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For writer-director Stephanie Laing, her wry comedy Family Squares, is highly personal since it was inspired by the loss of her mother back in 2019. It’s also a love letter to her family that is stacked with an outstanding ensemble cast who use Zoom to communicate with one another while occupying virtual cubicles.
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It is Stephanie Laing’s sophomore film as director, but much of the power of Family Squares is in the story. She co-wrote the screenplay, which was conceived as a COVID film, channeling experience from loss in her own life. It was originally called Spring Hope, after the small town near her family farm, and was based on a farm visit with her kids to say goodbye to her dying grandmother. Cut to a few years later when she was sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner in New York. She got a call from LA that her mother was dying, and had to said goodbye over FaceTime. These elements came together during the pandemic. Laing was considering the fact that over 200,000 Americans had died without being able to spend the last moments with each other in person, and found a way to tell all these emotional stories while keeping it real and funny and relatable.
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Family Squares resonated with me on a very personal level. Everything from the weeping to inside jokes about which family members didn’t know how to locate the mute button made me smile. Writer-director Stephanie Laing understands the complexities that exist within a family unit. This massive all-star cast includes Henry Winkler, June Squibb, Ann Dowd, Judy Greer, Margo Martindale, Elsie Fisher, Casey Wilson, Bill Magnussen, Scott MacArthur, Sam Richardson, Zoe Chao, Timothy Simons, Jessica Miesel, and Maclaren Laing. Four generations of actors come together for one joyous and funny film.
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