Annie Clark, better known as indie rocker St. Vincent, has always molded her stage persona to fit the moment. But for her film “The Nowhere Inn,” she wanted to show her “real” side and finally take “control of the narrative.”
The only problem is, she admits in the first trailer for the film that somewhere along the line, things went “terribly wrong.”
“The Nowhere Inn” is part concert documentary — with St. Vincent and her friend Carrie Brownstein of “Portlandia” and Sleater-Kinney fame appearing as themselves — but the story is fictional and more than a bit surreal, with a mix of horror and sketch humor.
In the film, Clark recruits Brownstein to make a concert documentary about St. Vincent while showing the real Annie Clark behind the scenes. But when Brownstein tries to coax some of St. Vincent’s onstage energy into the offstage Annie, her stage presence begins to overtake her real life and merge in unexpectedly dark ways. The film follows the two close friends’ attempt to wrestle the truth out of a complex subject before the hall of mirrors that is their artistic lives devours them completely.
If St. Vincent’s persona on her new album “Daddy’s Home,” which released last Friday, feels like a massive departure from the neon spandex of “Masseduction,” “The Nowhere Inn” might have something to do with it. At Sundance in 2020, Clark told TheWrap this film “blows up” the St. Vincent persona and made her practically ready to retire.
“The Nowhere Inn” is directed by first-time filmmaker Bill Benz, a frequent “Portlandia” collaborator and writer, and includes real concert footage from St. Vincent’s tour. IFC Films plans to release the movie in theaters, on demand and on digital on Sept. 17.
Check out the trailer for “The Nowhere Inn” above, and you can also pre-order the film here.
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