Producers: Logan Lerman and Jonathan Schwartz   Director: Austin Peters   Screenplay: Sam Freilich, Austin Peters and Deering Regan  Cast: Elizabeth Banks, Lewis Pullman, Luis Gerardo Méndez, Michaela Jaé Rodriguez, Nathan Fillion, Erik Palladino, John Billingsley, Jason Manuel Olazábal and Jesse Saler   Distributor: IFC Films

Grade: C

Austin Peters’ satirical thriller about skullduggery within the California skin care community is obviously inspired by an actual case—that of Dawn DaLuise, the aesthetician-owner of a shop called Skin Refinery, who was accused of plotting the murder of rival Gabriel Suarez, owner-operator of Smooth Cheeks, and spent nearly a year in jail before being acquitted at trial. Though it doesn’t explicitly acknowledge the debt, it’s even set in 2013, about the time of the actual events.   (After her exoneration DaLuise, one might note. opened a new place called Killer Facials.)

It’s a pretty juicy tale (the case implicated Nick Prugo, who’d been a member of the notorious teen Bling Ring), but one handled with less than optimal finesse by Peters and his co-writers Sam Freilich and Deering Regan. “Skincare” tries to keep us guessing while lobbing potshots at the vanity-based industry, but does neither very well. 

Elizabeth Banks is extravagantly over-the-top as Hope Goldman, the DaLuise stand-in, whose boutique beauty shop caters to the rich and famous in Los Angeles.  She’s also about to launch her own expensive, custom-made line of cosmetics, which she’s planning to promote via an interview on a local morning talk show hosted by a stilted fellow named Brett (Nathan Fillion). 

Hope is an enthusiastic entrepreneur but not, it appears, an especially astute one from a practical perspective.  She’s behind on her rent, constantly putting off her landlord Jeff (John Billingsley), and could lose her lease on the shop’s swanky location.  And while always putting on a perky, upbeat face, she’s extremely upset when a competitor, Angel Vergara (Luis Gerardo Méndez) opens a new shop, Shimmer Skin, just across the street from hers.  Her discomfort increases when Brett bumps her taped launch interview for one featuring Vergara, who boasts that his anti-aging treatments are based on discoveries by NASA. She also has to do some fast thinking to deflect Brett when the married man promises to broadcast the interview later in return for some late-night consideration.  He’s only the first man to look on the attractive, increasingly desperate Hope as a potential conquest.

But worse is to come.  Arriving at work one morning, Hope’s informed by her secretary/bookkeeper Marine (Michaela Jaé Rodriguez) that an email’s been sent to all her clients in which she not only confesses to her financial woes but indicates that she’s having an emotional breakdown.  Then the tires on her care are slashed, and a burly ruffian (Jesse Saler) shows up at the shop in response to a message that Hope’s available to provide sexual services.  She’s certain that Angel’s behind it all, but gets no satisfaction by confronting him, or by contacting a police detective (Jason Manuel Olazábal) for help. 

So Hope starts doing some stalking of her own, especially after her home is broken into, and tries to add a gun to her defensive arsenal of mace. She also gets offers of assistance from a couple of men.  Once is Armen (Erik Palladino), the mechanic who helps with the tires and shows some interest in dating her.  The other is Jordan (Lewis Pullman), an old acquaintance who’s now a self-styled life coach; he effectively suggests becoming her personal protector.  But things continue to deteriorate, until everything unravels and the truth of the matter is revealed, not to Hope’s advantage. 

“Skincare” might have been fashioned as a statement about the difficulties female entrepreneurs face in struggling to succeed, or as a scathing commentary on the upper-end cosmetics business,. But it’s content to skirt any deeper issues in favor of an obvious portrait of a driven but rather scatterbrained young woman and a whodunit that, in the end, opts for a lazy resolution.  What might have been a sharp satire instead emerges as a disappointingly skin-deep comedy of errors with a downbeat close.

Nevertheless one has to recognize the full-throated effort Banks puts into the piece—she’s on the screen virtually non-stop, and holds it expertly even as the plot goes haywire, helped by Christopher Ripley’s cinematography, which suggests a world closing in on her as some even suspect she might have engineered everything as a publicity stunt, and Fatima Al Quadiri’s score, which morphs from the bubbly to something more discordant.  And while no one else in the cast has an opportunity to make much of an impression, despite a limited budget the picture enjoys some creamy visual panache as a result of Liz Toonkel’s production design and Angelina Vitto’s costumes.  But Laura Zemoel’s editing can’t always successfully cope with the tonal shifts.

In the end “Skincare” is a film with potential, but unfortunately fails to realize it.