The Reception

Digitally filmed on a shoestring budget, "The Reception" is an ugly-looking movie occupied by artificial characters going through the motions of familial unrest and gay attraction. Pamela Holden Stewart plays a troubled domineering French woman living in snowy upstate New York where she houses Wayne Lamont as a gay black painter. The tortured matriarch gets a weekend visit from her estranged daughter, played by Margaret Burkwit, who brings her new "husband" with her in order to collect on an inheritance. As the characters show their true colors the feigned drama disintegrates.

Unrated, 80 mins. (D-) (One Star)