Vulcanizadora, 2025.
Directed by Joel Potrykus.
Starring Joshua Burge, Joel Potrykus, Bill Vincent, Solo Potrykus, Jaz Edwards, Sherryl Despres, Scott Ayotte, Melissa Blanchard, Dennis Grantz, G. Foster II, and Michael Saunders.
SYNOPSIS:
Two friends take a trip through a Michigan forest, intent on carrying out a disturbing pact.
Following two middle-aged friends wandering around in a Michigan forest, one wonders exactly where co-star, writer, and director Joel Potrykus is taking Vulcanizadora— an equally confounding title that, in addition to sounding like gibberish, offers little information. What is clear is that these friends have polar opposite personalities and highly different moods about this hangout.
Joshua Burge’s Derek is more extroverted and determined to have a good time, whereas Joel Potrykus’s Marty is stone-faced, as if he didn’t want to come here in the first place. Is he depressed, with Derek trying to show him a good time and remind him how to live again? That could be the case since Derek’s idea of fun is somewhat juvenile, harkening back to childhood shenanigans, such as uncovering buried nude magazines, rocking out to heavy metal at night while camping, burning snake fireworks, and blowing up bottle rockets inside empty Gatorade bottles. He even tempts fate, requesting Marty to shoot one of those fireworks off near his face as an intentionally stupid stunt designed to earn some social media popularity.
Nevertheless, that doesn’t answer the question of where any of this is going. At times, the film takes this slow-burning, lackadaisical approach to the extreme, indulging in cinematic shots of the two maneuvering their way through the forest, sometimes with overhead shots of them slowly walking down a hill, with an emphasis on the word ‘slowly’. It can be slightly maddening, but there are also just enough drippings of exposition to keep us hooked on what the purpose of this journey is.
Without getting too much into the details, Vulcanizadora reveals that Derek and Marty are in midlife crises. From there, an understanding of what they are trying to achieve through this isolation sets off ripples throughout the rest of the narrative, unfolding as a grim, gallows-humor dark comedy about existence (I’m trying to be vague here). Something happens, with one of these characters now having a heavy guilty conscience, trying in a nervously paranoid, unsure way to confess and be held accountable, only for the world not to care about pursuing these leads. Watching the film puts this into a much greater, darker social commentary context that is nearly impossible to shake, and more than makes up for a tedious start that borders on insufferable.
Having worked together before, it’s also evident that Joshua Burge and Joel Potrykus are on the same wavelength, both delivering gut-wrenching performances that touch upon social rejection, loneliness, and a palpable feeling that the walls are closing in on their lives. They also happen to be the wrong people to support one another, as they enable self-destructive and negatively influential behavior. By the end, Vulcanizadora is a subtle, quiet scream about the importance of seeking therapy for mental health concerns, especially within somewhat emotionally closed-off men.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association, Critics Choice Association, and Online Film Critics Society. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews and follow my BlueSky or Letterboxd
