This deadpan comedy is a strange film. I tried hard but found it a difficult film to get acclimatised with. There is much to admire but the overall experience left me empty and a little bewildered. Set in the harsh, plain sunny streets of LA the story follows the lives of a family trio of dysfunctional grifters, parents Robert (Richard Jenkins) and Theresa (Debra Winger) and their twenty something daughter who they've named Old Dolio for absurd and demeaning reasons (Evan Rachel Wood). They spend their lives scamming and stealing from people and come up with a plan for an airline luggage con during which Robert & Theresa meet the apparently normal Melanie (Gina Rodriguez) who ends up joining their band but who sees that Old Dolio is repressed but starting to realise her bizarre lifestyle is not normal. She decides to help her break free from the clutches of her parents. There is a style here and Wood is especially good although the film is bleak and in it's surreal narrative structure it lacks a warmth that I felt it needed to make it a more endearing and uplifting story.
No-one understands the longings of the human heart like Miranda July, and as one critic put it 'she has this way of crawling into the little crevices of emotion that I don't even have names for'. I loved her previous two films, but this is not as good. Kajillionaire is her unique take on the American con movie. There are elements of comedy which seemed contrived and didn't work for me. But of course there were parts to love; her stunning video art installation moments, and a couple of heart-stopping insights into the human condition: but not enough of them. It felt too conventional; and I never thought I would say that about a Miranda July film.