Bound Review: Alexandra Faye Sadeghian’s Otherwise Intense Performance Can’t Overcome Isaac Hirotsu Woofter’s Clunky Indie Drama

Bound marks the feature-length directorial debut of Isaac Hirotsu Woofter, who previously cut his teeth making short films. Woofter, who also wrote the screenplay, doesn’t waste time establishing his plot promisingly right from the get-go: A young introvert named Bella (Alexandra Faye Sadeghian) finds herself stuck amid a domestic violence between her poor mother, Yeva (Pooya Mohseni) and abusive, drug-dealing stepdad, Gordy played by Bryant Carroll in their nondescript home somewhere in the countryside.

Gordy also turns out to be mentally unstable, coupled with his unpredictable, erratic behaviour. We see Bella has suffered enough with the ongoing abuse, particularly with how Woofter decides to thrust his opening scene right into the heart of the story. For Bella, the only way out is to save herself and her mother by chasing her stepdad out of their house. This results in her threatening him, which seems to be working, but her mother remains forgiving as if she can’t live without Gordy.

Bella has no choice but to flee without her mother, bringing her pet squirrel and heading for New York City to start afresh. But she has to endure sleeping on the streets, but it doesn’t take long before she’s lucky enough to meet some good people. There’s a foreign shopkeeper who knows she’s been sneaking in some food but only pays for a can of beverage, and yet, he’s letting her off.

Then, there’s Owais (Rahim Karimloo), who’s kind enough to give her a chance to work at his coffee shop, even though she doesn’t have a resume with her. Bella also made friends with clothing designer Standrick (Jaye Alexander) and bartender Marta (Jessica Pimentel), where the latter offers her a place to stay.

Understandably, Woofter wants to shed some positive light into his otherwise gritty drama, bringing in a sense of hope amidst the despair and struggle that befalls upon Bella. Still, I can’t help but feel Woofter’s screenplay is just too contrived to resolve Bella’s plight in a way of meeting one kind stranger after another which sounds too good to be true. It feels like it’s straight up from a glossy Hollywood drama instead of something which gears into more slice-of-life indie sensibilities in its execution.

For a movie that’s about a struggling young woman trying to survive in a big city like New York, I was expecting the story to have more grit rather than superficially throwing in some difficult path within Bella’s journey and then, a continuous stroke of luck somehow happens in her favour. Woofter also attempts to raise the stakes halfway through his movie, shifting from a drama-heavy approach to an unlikely thriller territory with the re-appearance of Gordy.

The second half is where the movie starts to fall apart. And even though I get the movie tries to tell us that one can’t escape the dark past, the execution makes me feel like Woofter is trying too hard to layer his movie. It is as if all of a sudden, this isn’t just about Bella’s coming-of-age story but also about addressing Gordy’s increasingly volatile mental health.

What equally bothers me here is how the act of coincidence takes shape in this movie. The kind of twist that’s more of a storytelling excuse than an organic way to bring back Bella’s trauma once again upon facing her recurring biggest nightmare. It doesn’t help either when Carroll’s supporting performance as Gordy tends to get overwrought to the point it becomes unintentionally over-the-top for his own good.

Despite most of its shortcomings, Bound does benefit from Alexandra Faye Sadeghian’s committed lead performance as the estranged Bella. Some of the supporting roles, notably Ramin Karimloo, Jessica Pimentel and Jaye Alexander, deserve equal mention here. If only the overall writing and direction would do them more justice in their otherwise above-average acting roles, that would help a lot in bringing the right balance into the movie.