USA – 2010 – 84 MIN – COLOUR - FEATURE - IN ENGLISH
A FILM BY MIKE OTT
When her car breaks down on a site-seeing tour of California, a Japanese student winds up stranded in a small desert town.
Exhilarated by a sudden sense of freedom, she extends her stay and finds friendship, romance, and what promises to be a new home. But as she pulls back the layers on this unlikely paradise, she discovers a different America than the one in her dreams.
"Really bad things often seem on the verge of happening in LITTLEROCK – physical violence, rape, maybe even murder – but they never do. Because that would imply energy and exertion, and Littlerock, the California desert town, pop. 12,600, that gives this quietly arresting film its name, isn’t much on action of any kind, ‘cept partying."
- THE GLOBE AND MAIL
"Ott’s knack for telling observations and beguiling ambiguities make him a director to watch."
- EYE WEEKLY
"Writer-director Ott captures the bored-townie vibe so well, you’ll be squirming in your seat. It brings unexpected poignancy to his story of young people trying to get past language and culture barriers – and just communicate."
- NOW MAGAZINE
"It’s what makes the interactions in writer/director Mike Ott’s indie drama so delightful, so fascinating and so sad."
- THE NATIONAL POST
"A nicely pitched filmic playlet on how others see us, LITTLEROCK puts Middle America under a microscope and breathes life into the mundane."
- TORONTO SUN