If Paula González-Nasser’s directorial debut “The Scout” has a single thesis, it’s that humans are quite comfortable opening up to someone they see as invisible. Sofia (Mimi Davila) learns that firsthand by working one of the most thankless jobs in entertainment: a location scout. She spends her days traversing New York City, entering strangers’ apartments to take photos she’ll show a department head who will eliminate all but one.
Nobody else who works on (or watches) these films ever thinks about the people who live in these locations for the rest of the year. And the feeling is often mutual, as some residents barely care what’s being shot in their homes so long as an easy paycheck is on the table. Their brief encounters with Sofia are often their only point of contact with the entire filmmaking process, and they make up the core of “The Scout.”
González-Nasser draws on her own experience as a New York-based location scout on shows like “High Maintenance” and “Russian Doll,” using the fiction film to reflect on the unique experience of spending your days in other people’s most intimate spaces while remaining a complete stranger. It creates some awkward moments, but more often she ends up serving as a quasi-therapist to people who want to spill their problems to someone they know they’ll never see again. Whether it’s grandmas proudly showing off family pictures while barely masking sadness over not seeing relatives enough, or online scammers sharing incriminating information amid light sexual harassment, Sofia ends up experiencing a far wider spectrum of the human condition than anyone who spends their days on sets with the same film crews.
“The Scout” is a quiet, episodic film in the classic tradition of New York indies about artists filling their days with small interactions that range from painfully awkward to pleasantly inconsequential. (It’s no coincidence that Ryan Martin Brown, who directed the very similar film “Free Time,” serves as a producer and editor.) But one notable point of differentiation is how it juxtaposes its leisurely pacing with a protagonist who is constantly stressed. Sofia might be running around trying to please four bosses in an ever-changing game of musical locations where something is always falling through, but she seldom has anyone to voice those feelings to.
As a result, we get the dryly amusing experience of watching these frantic days as complete outsiders without access to her internal monologue. It offers some valuable (if humbling) perspective to those of us who have endured the stresses of small-time filmmaking. Few things feel more difficult in the moment, but the rest of the world likely has no idea what’s happening and could not care less.
While it’s not the kind of film to give its protagonist a heavy-handed growth arc, “The Scout” gradually expands our understanding of Sofia. At first, the sparse dialogue lulls us into the same dismissive patterns as the residents of the apartments she scouts. It’s easy to see her as an invisible vessel that only serves to introduce us to new characters. But through small moments and occasional breaks from work, it becomes clear she’s more complex and has bigger dreams than her narrow role in the film world allows. Spending your days exploring other people’s spaces while you still feel behind schedule in creating your own comes with its own unique mental challenges.
At its best, “The Scout” captures the contradictory experience of having a job closer to your dreams than many people ever get, but still far from where you want to be. Location scouting was not Sofia’s goal in life, but whenever the grind is about to wear her down, she has to hear one of her corporate friends express their jealousy that she gets to spend her days running around making TV shows. It creates complicated feelings you could spend weeks parsing through — until another shoot day shifts, and you have to sprint through Brooklyn to find another apartment.
Grade: B-
A Greenwich Entertainment release, “The Scout” is now playing at Film Forum in New York City. It opens at the Alamo Drafthouse Los Angeles on October 2, with a nationwide expansion to follow this fall.
