Running Stumbled

Documentary begins when fiction leaves the scene. Rarely in filmmaking does the theory meet the practice, but in the case of the powerful, gritty Running Stumbled, director John Maringouin manages to take us into the heart of the matter in a dramatic exploration of family, life, art, drugs, murder, love, and legacy. After a 25-year absence, Maringouin the prodigal son returns from Hollywood to Terrytown, Louisiana. Placed in the center of an emotional battle, he films an intimate, frank and strange portrait about the complex relationship between his estranged father, Dadaist painter Johnny Roe Jr., and Roe's self-destructive common-law wife, Virgie Marie Pennoui. Johnny is a New Orleans legend, known for being a career heroin user, a street-fighting pimp, and an accused murder. He also once tried to kill his son. Running Stumbled is a dark, Southern Gothic fable, as dramatic as it is cautionary, enveloped in an atmosphere that has its main characters chasing demons and pursued by death. (PW)