Transamerica

I very much enjoyed Transamerica last night. Felicity Huffman's portrayal of a transsexual is very well observed, and assisted, I imagine, by some very skilled make-up and costume. That bloke-trying-slightly-too-hard-to-look-feminine look is captured expertly. I particularly liked the drag queen lipstick and over-abundance of pink. So is it just a light veneer covering a very formulaic road movie? Perhaps, but, for me, the changing American landscape did add something. It's all to easy for us to forget the size of that continent and driving across it probably would change your outlook of a few things. I suspect the film exagerates how quickly you could do this (we get to Texas with suspicious speed), but there is some plot to get on with, and the deadline of Bree's approaching surgery means that the journey has to proceed briskly. Anyway, a nicely judged piece that doesn't try to force a message. And that's good.