‘Sand’ Effects : Local Filmmakers Created a Serviceable Noir Drama, but the Impression It Leaves Is Too Familiar

Young filmmakers often turn to crime to muscle Hollywood. A pair of brothers, the Coens, grabbed the attention of major studios in the ‘80s with a little bullets-and-revenge number called “Blood Simple.”

Joel and Ethan Coen are huge now; their latest, “Fargo,” was nominated for a best picture Oscar this year.

Harris and Erik Done, brothers who lived in and around Anaheim for several years, would probably kill to follow in the Coens’ bloody footprints. Like “Blood Simple,” their first feature is also a modern film noir, called “Sand Trap” and playing in Orange through May 1.

“Sand Trap” comes with a bit of fanfare, having garnered the audience award as one of the most popular independent pictures screened at the recent Newport Beach International Film Festival.

It tells a familiar story of marital murder in a workmanlike, efficient way. Director Harris (who wrote the script with Jerry Rapp and co-produced with Rapp and sibling Erik) handles the restrictions of this cash-poor venture smoothly, taking us from setup to setup with a fair degree of quirkiness.

*

But is “Sand Trap” inspired movie-making, as “Blood Simple” was? No. Reportedly made for less than $100,000 in 1984, the Coens’ stylish film all but oozes with pulp-fiction sleaze and corruption; “Sand Trap,” with a budget the Dones don’t want to reveal, is less inventive as a story and cinematically.

One scene, though, resonates with originality. The once-victim, now-pursuer, covers himself with sand in the Mojave Desert, only a bit of his sneering face showing. Like a beetle hungry for an unsuspecting ant, he waits for his would-be murderers to stumble by. The passage looks great and tickles as well.

*

How the victim got to that point is pretty predictable, with the screenplay hewing closely to film-noir cliches. A beautiful woman (Elizabeth Morehead) with sexual voltage to spare teams with her glowering lover (Brad Koepenick) to kill her nice, foolish husband (David John James). There’s his estate and hefty life insurance at stake. Double indemnity and all that.

But the crime doesn’t turn out the way they planned, and the bleak landscape suddenly gets a lot hotter. While the wife and her man fornicate and scheme, a local sheriff tries to figure everything out. It takes him awhile, and in the meantime, we get to see the husband go bonkers under the sun, devolving into a kind of Mad Max character, self-decorated with hubcaps and other desert trash and ready to exact some revenge.

*

That part is funny, as is the wife’s eagerness to yank off her top and get down in the dirt at any time, even when that nosy cop is closing in. But most of “Sand Trap” is predictable; it’s not boring, but you do feel like you’ve been there before.

Implausibilities, which tend to stick out like untidy corpses in any crime melodrama, also slow “Sand Trap.” The movie seems to take place over two or three days, but the husband takes to eating raw lizards and almost drinking his own urine the very next day. He couldn’t have found the road leading back to town?

*

Also, why wasn’t a helicopter brought out sooner? Wouldn’t the sheriff have organized a gang of locals for the search? The ending is also farfetched, which suggests that the Dones may be tweaking the genre more than a little. If so, it isn’t a good enough joke.

The acting is decent. James makes the husband initially so mushy you expect him to collapse at any moment. Koepenick doesn’t do much more than frown, but it’s a cool frown, almost metallic in its hardness.

*

Morehead has the tastiest role. The actress, star of the new “Flipper” TV series, gets to play a first-order predator, and she really seems to enjoy herself. It’s not easy to tell if the wife’s favorite hobby is bumping and grinding or killing. She’s lusty about both.

“Sand Trap” is supposed to be a calling card, something the Dones hope will underscore their potential to Hollywood types. You can almost hear them telling executives, “Just imagine what we could do with some real money!” Despite the film’s flaws, the brothers do show talent. Go ahead, schedule a meeting.

* “Sand Trap,” an independent film by Harris and Erik Done, screens daily at Captain Blood’s Village Theatre, 1140 N. Tustin Ave., Orange. Show times: 4:30, 7 and 9:30 p.m. daily, with 11:45 a.m. and 2 p.m. matinees Saturday and Sunday and a midnight screening Friday and Saturday. $3.50-$5.50. Through May 1. (714) 538-3545.