'Knives and Skin'

Writer-director Jennifer Reeder’s high school noir drama “Knives and Skin” feels like the unwanted love child of David Lynch and Paul Thomas Anderson — a dozen different stylistic ideas going off in different directions, often canceling each other out.

It starts with two teens at Makeout Point, or whatever kids call it these days. Andy KItzmiller (Ty Olwin) is the star of the football team, and Carolyn Harper (Raven Whitley) is the nerdy marching-band drummer who will be Andy’s latest conquest. When Carolyn gets scared and repels Andy’s grabby advances, the jock leaves Carolyn on the gravel road.

Carolyn doesn’t come home that night, leaving her single mom, Lisa (Marika Engelhardt), a wreck. The girl’s disappearance also has an effect on the other kids in school — particularly Andy’s sister, Joanna (Grace Smith), who knows something is up with her brother. Joanna is having her own problems, like running scams like selling used underwear belonging to her agoraphobic mom, Lynn (Audrey Francis), to the skeevy principal (Tony Fitzpatrick).

Meanwhile, Joanna and Andy’s dad, Dan (Tim Hopper), is having an affair with Renee Darlington (Kate Arrington), the glitter-obsessed wife of the sheriff, Doug (James Vincent Meredith). And the Darlington’s cheerleader daughter, Laurel (Kayla Carter), is falling in love with Bridey (Genevieve Venjohnson), a classmate in Mrs.Harper’s girls’ choir class.

There are surely some subplots I missed in Reeder’s “Peyton Place” plot. It’s easy to get lost in Reeder’s random flashes of oddness, like the choir’s funereal renditions of ‘80s pop songs (including “I Melt With You” and “Whisper to a Scream”) or the way Carolyn’s corpse becomes a subject of the camera’s fascination, somewhere between “Twin Peaks’” Laura Palmer and “Weekend at Bernie’s.”

Reeder settles down in the second half, letting the angst-filled teen girls of her story wrestle back some emotional honesty from the onslaught of cinematic showboating. But it’s not enough to rescue “Knives and Skin” from its pretensions.

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‘Knives and Skin’

★1/2

Opens Friday, December 6, at the Megaplex at The Gateway (Salt Lake City), Megaplex Jordan Commons (Sandy), Megaplex at The District (South Jordan) and Megaplex Thanksgiving Point (Lehi). Not rated, but probably R for violence, sexuality and drug use - most of it involving teens. Running time: 112 minutes.