
When a path forward finally yet belatedly arrives in the form of the impish, rule-breaking Bobbi Kitten (a real-life artist playing a loose version of herself), an alluring figure who charitably decides to take Lennon under her protective wing, “Poser” immediately finds new life. The directing partners’ tone in these segments sway between lovingly satirical and experimental, a narrative fusion that feels directionless at times.

Through entertaining, snippily assembled sequences (the duo handled editing duties themselves) during which Lennon records her podcast, we get acquainted with various bands, from “WYD” to “Son of Dribble,” and hear from an idiosyncratic bunch that soulfully speak straight into the camera, defining their style with a variety of amusing jargons like “Junkyard Bop” and “Queer Death Pop.” Fortunately, they have some fun with this navel-gazing mode. That’s because instead of building the fake-it-till-you-make-it Lennon with any kind of complexity on a micro level, Segev and Dixon dive head-first into the dizzying macro universe that surrounds her. Ripley” and, more recently, “Ingrid Goes West.” The moment Lennon, portrayed by Mix in an unnerving performance that blends wide-eyed awe and alarming apathy, googles, “How to start a podcast,” you somehow sense that she’s up to no good.įor some time though, we can’t quite get inside her head. Working at a dead-end job as a maid by day, she possesses a chilling, double-edged obsession for things out of her reach, the destructiveness of which we’ve seen many times before in the likes of “The Talented Mr.

Her name is Lennon Gates (Sylvie Mix), a wannabe artist/musician dwelling on the fringes of the world she so desperately wants to belong to that she is prepared to do whatever it takes to make it.

So consider it an act of generosity by the filmmakers that someone equally on the outside leads the way into “Poser,” making you feel a little less alone as you find your feet within this fascinating counterculture.
