“Laura Smiles” is an alarmingly effective portrait of a woman’s mental breakdown. We are introduced to “Laura” at her happiest time, in a warm, loving relationship with her fiancé (a very appealing Kip Pardue) in the city, literally the love of her life. In flashbacks, we then see the sweet development of this relationship out of order as these moments become brightly lit and colored memories that desperately intrude on her later in life, as she becomes consumed with guilt and remorse over his fate. These feelings start to overwhelm her current life as a wife and mother. As something inconsequential in what she calls her “suburban drudgery” triggers the past — in the supermarket, cooking, cleaning, at a school play– she acts out increasingly aberrantly to counteract the feelings they generate, especially when she can no longer distinguish past from present from dreams, recalling Blanche Du Bois.

When a crop of doped-up athletes from the Lakecrest College swim team dive into the campus lake to blow off some steam, the bloodsucking leeches below the surface undergo a stunning transformation. After ingesting small amounts of the swimmers’ steroid-laced blood, the slimy creatures grow to unusual sizes and set out to sink their teeth into an unsuspecting student population.

The interwoven stories of three couples which are forced to make life altering decisions in the face of a disastrous war. Inspired and sometimes blinded by their love, Len, Mia, Andy, Esther, Anna and Erik are as flawed and beautiful as any of the billions who are facing this human-made biological disaster.