laurel canyon

Laurel Canyon is a film directed and written by Lisa Cholodenko about a man and his fiancé that stay at his mothers house and get wrapped up in each other’s lifestyles. The man, Sam grew up with his free spirited, ever-inebriated mother and her wild nature has turned him away from her. Instead of smoking marijuana, having consensual sex whenever desired, and joining the entertainment industry he went to Harvard medical school and became a doctor. He is very tense by nature and concerned about the atmosphere of his mothers house for his fiancé, who also is in the medical profession trying to finish her dissertation. Throughout the movie we see the mother’s adverse effect on her son, pushing him further and further away as they never seem to be sharing the same wavelengths or feelings, until Sam is confronted by an overdosing ecstasy patient whose mother reminds him a lot of himself. The last main character is the lead singer of the band whos record Sam’s mother is producing, who is also in a relationship with Sam’s mother. Sam grew up around these interweaving relationships and hates his mother for it, because she was concerned with her own fun instead of raising him. Ian, the British singer is exteremely endearing towards Sam’s fiancé and ends up tempting her into sexual relations as she finds herself catching up on the experiences of her life she skipped through being such a hard worker. The film is very intricate in its characters relationships which intertwine again and again throughout the movie, and the plot is carried by its characters personalities and actions rather than events which change their lives. Sam eventually falls for a woman a lot like himself, another doctor, but realizes he loves his wife, who is intrigued and tempted by the singer. At the end of the film all the relations between all the characters are discovered and Sam and his mother come to terms like they never have before and are finally happy and in their place.