Ryan Gosling’s directorial debut Lost River premiered at Cannes last year to some pretty harsh reviews, causing Warner Brothers to opt for a VOD release instead of a full theatrical one. Still, that doesn’t always mean a movie is a complete waste of time… sometimes things get a bad rap at Cannes for the wrong reasons. Now that the first trailer has arrived online, however, we can see why there might be cause for concern. Frankly, it’s pretty hard to make heads or tails of it.

From what we know the movie was partially inspired by the economic collapse of Detroit, but it is also a surreal and fantastical fairy tale that involves a secret underwater world. Clearly Gosling was influenced by his pal Nicolas Winding Refn (and perhaps a little bit of Lynch), but he may not have the vision to pull something like this off. The good news is that the cast is pretty solid and includes Christina Hendricks, Saoirse Ronan, Eva Mendes, Matt Smith, Ben Mendelsohn and Iain De Caestecker. Lost River hits select theatres and Digital HD on April 10th; check out the trailer after the jump and let us know what you think.