Kathleen Collins directed two films in her short life. “The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy” (1980), an adaptation of Henry H. Roth’s “The Cruz Chronicle: A Novel of Adventure and Close Calls,” is the first. Three Puerto Rican brothers live in a small New York town plagued with white flight and falling into disrepair. The ghost of their father, Poppa (Ernesto Gonzalez), who also serves as one of several narrators, watches over them and admonishes them to avoid a life of crime. When Miss Malloy (Sylvia Field) drives up in her olive-green Rolls Royce offering them a well-paid handyman job, they leap at the chance, but this opportunity troubles Poppa.
Only Victor (Randy Ruiz), the oldest, can see Poppa. Collins never shows what Victor can see and represents Poppa through the camera’s point of view. Its movement is supposed to symbolize Poppa floating above and around the brothers with his disembodied voice audible to the audience. He appears to try and keep them safe and advise them through the oldest, who appears to be solitary compared to his younger brothers who spend the most time together. Victor is constantly chatting with his father or to himself by dictating into a reel-to-reel tape recorder.
Victor is practical, responsible and contemplative. His recorded musings are like a lyrical anthropologist observing his surroundings, which includes his father’s coming and goings. He resides on the top floor of a ramshackle house while the younger two huddle on a lower floor before the tube television as if it was a fire. Victor’s abode symbolizes how he is closest to the spirit world, and “The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy” never implies that he is crazy. As the town deteriorates, it is almost as if its death has thinned the veil between the material and physical world, and the brothers are not the only ones in touch with dwellers from another dimension. Unlike a horror movie, these spirits are not a danger, but just unseen denizens who are unable to move because they are tied to the people who stayed. There are rules. Ghosts cannot coexist in the same space (paging “All of Us Strangers”). It is almost as if it is a literal ghost town. Except for a flashback, only the four living characters are shown in the present time though other people are alluded to: a lawyer and a woman who works at a liquor store
As a group, the brothers behave younger than their physique suggests that their ages are. Jose (Lionel Pina) has a sunny demeanor, resembles Victor the most, expresses gratitude and is the dreamer of the past and his future. Felipe (Jose Machado) is like an overgrown toddler given to tantrums, sulky and impulsive. They have a rambling routine with a penchant to play and commit property crimes to make ends meet, thus their father’s concern.
In contrast to the lifelong locals, who never appear and allegedly shun them out of prejudice and distrust, Miss Malloy is drawn to their liveliness and rambunctious exultations, but they are also the perfect property caretakers since they unwittingly share the similar unusual relationships with their deceased loved ones. She claims that she will die in a month, and when they go to her house, it appears that the eccentric lady of the house is distracted with ghosts and memories of the past. The brothers’ reaction to her and her property, a house in need of maintenance on huge, untamed grounds, is like a Rorschach test of their personalities. The house has a transforming or personality enhancing effect though the house is not innately supernatural. As a past heavily populated place, it is almost as if it has the residual energy signature of those who inhabited it.
“The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy” is odd and unpredictable. It may take several views to digest it. The first reaction may be, “What did I just watch” with an elusive sense that it zigged when most would expect a zag. Miss Malloy initially appears like a Miss Havisham type, but she ends up being a kindred spirit to one of the brothers, a mentor who encourages his dreams. There is a Gothic romantic allusion with ambiguous resolution, but it is the rare movie where it does not feel exploitive despite the age and power disparity. Even though it is not a possession story, the brother in question takes on a persona that harkens back to another age, and this persona provides the catalyst to mature which was missing before. If you think that it is Victor, you would be wrong. There is no protagonist. Each character takes turns in seamless transitions that do not feel episodic.
“The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy” is a disorienting experience and seems shapeless but give it another chance or two with some time to digest. With only a fifty-four-minute runtime, it is possible to do so without losing too much time. Upon the second viewing, the unpredictable narrative arc begins to suggest a steady hand steering the ship instead of feeling random and about nothing. By the third viewing, if you don’t walk away with a greater appreciation and understanding, then it is not your cup of tea, or in this case, a martini glass of ginger-ale (inside joke). The brothers’ experience with Miss Malloy individuates them and brings them together on the same level. In the first scene with the brothers, notice how Collins composes the scene to have Miss Malloy stand in between two of the three brothers with one of to the side. That arrangement portends the lasting effect that Miss Malloy will have on the brothers throughout the movie and helps create a more even playing field instead of Victor being a parental figure. Victor gets to join the land of the living.
Collins deliberately omits quotidian scenes that would be expected in a more conventional film. Collins treats her viewers like they are smart and does not explicitly delineate the brothers’ financial resolution. Because of the supernatural nature and prejudiced world of “The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy,” you may be concerned that something bad will happen, but it does not so do not waste any time being preoccupied. Collins sets a strict parameter for her film, and once Miss Malloy is no longer germane to the brothers, there is no onscreen resolution, which feels abrupt and unfinished, but is in keeping with the story’s integrity. While Miss Malloy is a three-dimensional character who does not exist for the sole purpose of the brothers’ character development, she is only shown in relation to them, so it is easy to forget that she is not a central character.
“The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy” is a haunting, bizarre film, which is a compliment. It depicts three brothers who are close and are arrested in development because of their past trauma, but find a way to be alive, individuals and together, while still acknowledging how death is an inevitable part of that life. Unlike most young people, they find comfort in a space that makes most people instinctually fear.