Dottie Gets Spanked (DVD)

Another dazzling suburban phantasm from writer-director Todd Haynes, Dottie Gets Spanked is a stylized, bittersweet nod to his childhood fascination with I Love Lucy. Deep in the heart of pre-hippie 1960s America, young artistically-inclined Steven Gale is obsessed with Dottie Frank, wacky star of the eponymous hit sitcom The Dottie Show. While his mother gently encourages the boy’s fixation, his father grows increasingly frustrated by his son’s apparently “sissified” interests. This provocative, heartfelt mini-feature anticipates Haynes’ multi-Oscar-nominated Far from Heaven with its excavation of placid mid-century surfaces and deeply-buried emotions.