In Clara’s Ghost, Chris Elliott’s family stars as…Chris Elliott’s family. Well, technically as the Reynolds family. Ted (Chris) is a once-famous actor, and his daughters Julie (Abby Elliott) and Riley (writer/director Bridey Elliott) are former children’s show stars (think Olsen twins). The non-actor matriarch of the Elliott clan, Paula Niedert Elliott, plays the titular character Clara, who is also the only one in the Reynolds who doesn’t work in the industry. And something is a little off with Clara. She rips up family photos that don’t seem as happy as the ones on facebook. She calls a winery in the middle of the night to compliment them on the look of their team. And she keeps seeing a ghost, a pale brunette in a flowing white dress, who no one else can see. The ghost may or may not be Adelia, the daughter of the former owner of the house, who was committed as a young woman, if the clippings in Clara’s office are to be believed.

The film takes place over one day at the family’s home in Connecticut, and events include a birthday celebration for Ollie, the family dog, a family photoshoot, and a contest to see who can keep their head in a bowl of ice water the longest. And drugs, as Riley’s high school friend and current pot dealer, Joe (Haley Joel Osment, where ya been??) stops by for the evening.

As Clara’s psyche begins to unravel, as her behavior becomes more erratic, the movie abandons a traditional presentation, often switching to quick cuts, odd, disorienting angles, and an overall psychedelic vibe.

The film seems to jump back and forth between genres, too, from dark comedy to supernatural horror, but it isn’t particularly funny or particularly scary. We’re can’t even be sure that Adelia exists anywhere other than in Clara’s mind. In the end, it’s really more of a surrealist Shakespearean tragedy than anything. It’s the interaction, the dynamic between the family members that makes this film interesting.

The family members, except Clara, are all shallow and completely self-absorbed. For example, Ted dances and sings “MacArthur Park” while drunk, not to his wife and family, but while gazing into a mirror. They act as though they’re completely open and honest with each other—brutally so, but that’s all it is—an act. They often use that honesty to attack each other, with Clara taking the lion’s share of abuse. At one point, a photographer from an entertainment magazine comes for a photoshoot. “When I say ‘family,’ what does it mean to you?” he asks. And yet, it’s obvious that even as Ted gives a canned response on the importance of family, that Clara has been left out of the “family” shoot. She’s not of that world, where the manufactured image of a Hollywood family replaces the real one. And when she asks the photog as he’s leaving if he can take one picture of her and Ted together, so she has a nice one, Ted turns on her, embarrassed. Doesn’t she know better?

And that’s really what the film is about—the effect that this family of entertainers has on the one person who isn’t one of “them.” Like The Godfather, there’s the family, and then there’s “the family.” And we can watch Clara’s descent into madness, as though she is finally realizing that she doesn’t really belong. She doesn’t know who these people are, anymore, and we’re not quite certain she ever did. “It’s not your face anymore,” Clara says to Julie, talking about her plastic surgery, but she might as well have been saying, “you’re not my daughter.” Twice, Clara dances to music that exists only in her head: “Georgy Girl” by The Seekers, to be specific. And one can’t help but notice the line, “Nobody you meet could ever see the loneliness there, inside you.”

In a movie where real-life relations are playing fictional relations, there’s a tendency to wonder, “is this who they really are? Is this how their family dynamic really works?” Probably not, but there likely is some truth in the portrayals. As Bridey said in an interview with Vulture, they’re playing the darkest versions of themselves. That’s where a lot of the dark humor comes in—when you hear them say something so awful, so mean-spirited, that you chuckle nervously, wondering how this family has survived this long.

“Nobody you meet could ever see the loneliness there inside you.”

The Seekers, “Georgy Girl”

One of the complaints I’ve heard about the film is that no one but someone in the family would find this family interesting, but I have to say I was intrigued watching the (admittedly cringeworthy) interaction between these characters. And as far as I know, I am not related to the Elliotts in any way. The acting was decent, in that you really don’t care for these characters, which is what I believe we’re supposed to feel for them. However, it’s ironic that the only non-actor of the bunch, Paula Niedert Elliott, gives the best performance, as Clara. It’s a really brave and nuanced performance, and I felt for her, even as I worried that she (or Adelia) might do her family some harm.

Ultimately, I thought this film took what could have been a clichéd subject and created an intelligent, and frankly disturbing look at the dysfunctional workings of a family that has clearly chosen the self over the family dynamic. IMDB gives it a 5.2, which I think is largely because this isn’t a horror-comedy, even though it’s being billed as one. That kind of marketing dishonesty always makes for disgruntled viewers. I’d put it more in the 6.0 range, or even a little more, with the caveat that you have to go into it eyes open, knowing that it’s probably not going to be what you expected. But like Adelia and Clara, this is a movie that just wants to be seen. (running time 1:20)