'The Drama' can't find its footing

 

  An intriguing movie gets lost somewhere in The Drama, the story of a pending marriage that's shaken when one of the partners reveals something horrible about her past.

  I won't spoil the big reveal, but I will say that Norwegian director Kristoffer Borgli might have done well to pick a less explosive issue for a story that begins with a coffeeshop cute-meet between the partners in this prospective couple.

   Museum curator Robert Pattinson falls quickly for literary editor Emma (Zendaya). They seem headed for the proverbial happily-ever-after, but Borgli's jittery direction suggests otherwise. 

  The story kicks into gear when Emma and Charlie meet with a couple who have become friends (Alana Haim and Momoudou Athie). After some drinking, Haim's character suggests they play a game in which each of them reveals the worst thing they've ever done. Emma's revelation shocks everyone and turns Haim's character judgmental. None of them are able to look at Emma in quite the same way again.

  At its best, The Drama toys with the way information can change and distort perception, creating a near-paranoid vision for Pattinson's Charlie, who turns out to be the least stable character in the movie. 

  Flashbacks to Emma's high school years feature Jordyn Curet as a teenager who was bullied, pointing to possible reasons for Emma's extreme youthful behavior, but these scenes aren't developed well enough to dig deeply. 

   Zendaya is caught between Borgli's comic aspirations and the story 's seriousness, and Pattinson delivers a stammering, halting performance that looks as disheveled as his haircut. Charlie's an annoying wreck, and we begin to wonder why Emma, the supposed shaky one, doesn't just dump him.

   Not surprisingly, the whole business moves toward a big wedding scene that features a major helping of excruciatingly presented comic conflict. By then, I'd given up on Borgli's ability to handle the movie's abundant tonal shifts. Throughout, Borgli leaps around in time, cutting into scenes to offer bits of flashback and fantasy and striking discordant notes with a musical score that, at times, suggests horror. 

     The Drama doesn't lack ambition. It uses an extreme example to pose interesting questions about relationships, but winds up being a dispiriting collection of hits, misses, and questionable choices.