A blis­ter­ing dark com­e­dy, Rebekah Frumk­in’s The Come­down is a romp across Amer­i­ca, from the Kent State shoot­ings to protest march­es in Chica­go to the Flori­da Ever­glades, that explores delin­eat­ing lines of race, class, reli­gion, and time.

Scrap­py, street smart drug deal­er Reg­gie Mar­shall has nev­er liked the sim­per­ing addict Leland Bloom-Mittwoch, which doesn’t stop Leland from look­ing up to Reg­gie with pup­py-esque devo­tion. But when a drug deal goes dra­mat­i­cal­ly, trag­i­cal­ly wrong and a suit­case (which may or may not con­tain a quar­ter of a mil­lion dol­lars) dis­ap­pears, the two men and their fam­i­lies become hope­less­ly entan­gled. It’s a mis­take that sets in motion a series of events that are odd, cap­ti­vat­ing, sus­pense­ful, and ulti­mate­ly inevitable.

Both incen­di­ary and earnest, The Come­down stead­fast­ly cat­a­logs the tan­gled mess­es the char­ac­ters make of their lives, nev­er los­ing sight of the beau­ty and pow­er of each fam­i­ly member’s capac­i­ty for love, be it for mon­ey, drugs, or each other.