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  • Dazedly: Review

    Dazedly: Review

    Dazedly: Review. By Ray Lobo.

    Director Anona Langa’s debut short film Dazedly plunges the viewer into the inner thoughts of its lead, Holly (Tesni Kujore).  Langa tells Holly’s story in a non-linear fashion.  This non-linearity is disorienting, but that disorientation pushes the viewer to actively piece together the source of Holly’s anguish. 

    Holly’s head is swimming with voices.  We isolate one voice saying, “She just left me.”  This sense of abandonment sets Holly off on a journey to find her birthmother.  Holly encounters a trio of sex workers that treat her disdainfully.  We can guess that her birthmother is somehow involved in sex work.  We catch glimpses of Holly’s lover, Mel (Craig Abbott).  We begin piecing together a twisted interrelationship between Holly’s mind, her mother, and Mel. 

    Kujore does a solid job conveying Holly’s disjointedness.  Kujore can conjure empathy in the viewer as she seeks to close the narrative loop of her birth.  Kujore can also convey a fragmented psyche.  We are not sure if Holly is suffering the effects of a troubled childhood or if a slow creeping psychosis is creating connections out of disparate life episodes.  If there is anything that makes Dazedly suffer, it is some of Langa’s directorial choices. 

    Langa’s use of music sometimes overpowers the narrative and makes parts of Dazedly feel like a music video—this is certainly the case in a sequence involving Holly performing sword dance moves with a Samurai sword.  It also feels as if Langa is packing too much story into a short film.  A story involving someone attempting to track down their birthmother, betrayal, and a disintegrating psyche, certainly seems like too much to explore in twenty minutes. 

    The good news for Langa is that there is quite an interesting story behind the intrusive music and Dazedly’s inadequate length.  Langa has an eye for setting, light, and character development.  One feels her best work is yet to come.

  • Enforcement: Review

    Enforcement: Review

    Enforcement Synopsis: Police officers, Jens (Sumon Sears) and Mike (Jacob Lohmann), are on routine patrol in Svalegården’s ghetto when the news of Talib’s death comes in over the radio, igniting uncontrollable rage and a lust for revenge in the ghetto’s youth, and the two officers must find a way out.

    After a tumultuous last few years, audiences’ relationship with police procedurals has evolved for the better. Gone are the days where glorified fantasy narratives prop up police into superhero-esque roles. Filmmakers are instead shifting their focus to portraying the police and their complex quandary of responsibilities, tapping into zeitgeist subject matter like policing ethics and their unbalanced race relations with dramatic impact.

    Thankfully, writer/directors Anders Ølholm and Frederik Louis Hviid have constructed a police film for our challenging modern times with Enforcement. While the duo establishes a seemingly-sturdy foundation, their well-meaning efforts ultimately divulge into a cookie-cutter actioner.

    If the opening frames were an indicator, Enforcement could have been one of the best police procedurals in some time. Ølholm and Hviid start with an eye for realism, allowing their depictions of day-to-day duties to speak volumes about the police experience. Jens may handle his responsibilities with a semblance of ethics and empathy, but Mike’s volatile behavior represents the violent corruption that has permeated generations of officers (a few challenging frames of abuse land with raw impact). I like that the writer/directors allow their first act to speak without being too overt, reflecting on their potentially-volatile ideas without spelling things out.

    It’s a shame that the initial intrigue ultimately goes nowhere. Ølholm and Hviid exhibit more prowess behind the camera than with their screenplay, with the duo ultimately embracing a generic sense of identity once the plot kicks into gear. Despite their ample screentime, neither Jens nor Mike develop into characters with much substance, while the potent depictions of racial discrimination aren’t expanded on as they should be (Mike wrestles with his past misgivings but without much urgency or depth). I wish the duo brought more dimension to the table, but their well-meaning efforts ultimately reduce into standard-issue action fare.

    As a taunt actioner, I can see how some audiences could jive with Ølholm and Hviid’s efforts. Their skilled hands implement an assured mixture of shaky-cam footage and intimate tight-frames, portraying violent skirmishes with tension and an eye for real-world impact. That being said, even their directorial strengths can’t overcome the material’s inherent inauthenticity. Enforcement should be the type of film that exists in a state of ambiguity, but Ølholm and Hviid can’t help drifting towards more conventional territory. The second half falters into a series of false frames, wasting pertinent social themes on a script too timid to engage with its own content.

    I wouldn’t label Enforcement as a bad film, but I can’t say the film works as intended either. Ølholm and Hviid disappointingly morph their strong conceptual design into been-there-done-that action movie fare.

  • Promising Young Woman: Another Review

    Promising Young Woman: Another Review

    Promising Young Woman: Another Review. By Nick Boyd.

    “Promising Young Woman,” a provocative and uncompromising dark drama, stars Carey Mulligan in a fearless and haunting performance as Cassie, a 30-year-old medical school dropout, who works at a coffee shop and lives with her parents.  At night, though, Cassie goes to bars pretending to be really drunk, so she can turn the tables on less than scrupulous men who think they can take advantage of her at their place.  As the multilayered narrative unravels, we learn Cassie’s motivation for doing this, which stems from an incident in her past.  

    One day, a former classmate of Cassie’s named Ryan (played by Bo Burnham) stops by her coffee shop with the intention of trying to go on a casual date with her.  A sweet romance develops between the two of them as Ryan’s awkward, likeable personality is able to win Cassie over, a refreshing change of pace from the shallow guys she encounters at the bar.  Ryan is a pediatric doctor and remarks that Cassie (had she not dropped out of medical school) would have made a great doctor.

    Cassie’s ultimate ruthless mission throughout the film is to try to right the wrong from her past and that involves meeting with people she feels played a part in the incident that took place.  She puts forth a no-nonsense attitude in these meetings expecting some kind of remorse or accountability.

    The editing and cinematography effectively conveys the mood of the film and Cassie’s state of mind.  The writing, with its insights and cleverness, really shines for the most part.

    Some elements in the picture I found did not work.  When Ryan is singing in the pharmacy, I thought it came across as overly cheesy and somewhat takes you out of the movie the way it was done.  When Cassie takes a crowbar to a random guy’s truck on the road, it did not make sense why she would have done that.  

    The last part of the film, which will not be revealed, is about as harrowing as they come, and is sure to be a conversation starter about female revenge.  

    The twists and turns will keep you guessing in a movie with a lot on its mind, particularly ethics and gender.  By no means an easy watch, the film nonetheless takes you on a wild, exhilarating ride that leaves a lasting impression. 

  • Phobias: Review

    Phobias: Review

    Phobias Synopsis: Five dangerous patients, suffering from extreme phobias at a government testing facility, are put to the ultimate test under the supervision of a crazed doctor and his quest to weaponize fear. The film’s story is told in an anthology structure with five directors crafting the six parts.

    Anthology storytelling is a complex beast. The idea of multiple filmmakers contributing their own stylistic sections into one narrative has an initial allure, but it seems a majority of these offerings feel every bit of their patchwork design. Recent examples like the V/H/S and ABCs of Death films only worked in scattershot windows, never finding the consistency or cohesiveness to pull off their unique set-up.

    The latest to attempt the anthology gauntlet Phobias takes a horror lens towards five damaged patients suffering at a government facility. While riddled with inconsistencies, the film’s team of upcoming filmmakers (Camilla Belle, Mariette Go, Joe Still, Jess Varley, and Chris von Hoffman – each writing and directing their own vignettes) craft a fittingly gnarly genre vehicle from their intriguing conceits.

    In their efforts to mesh the supernatural with the super-powered, the filmmaker quintet establishes its own macabre identity onscreen. Each vignette utilizes muted color tones and ingenious techniques to maximize the film’s low-budget assets, setting a foreboding sense of atmosphere that permeates through every frame. The five filmmakers continuously impress with their ability to push the premise’s creative elements to their limits. Between the film’s series of haunting specters and bloody encounters, Phobias effectively digs its nails under the audience’s skin.

    I also credit the quintet for approaching their subject matter with a sense of humanity. While their stories vary from a content perspective (they range from an isolated man discovering newfound powers to a woman suffering from PTSD), each finds cohesion through the filmmakers’ depictions of mental degradation. I love how the visceral horrors manifest the characters and magnify their deeply-seated traumas, with Phobias operating at its best when connecting itself to the struggles of its societal outsider protagonists.

    Phobias is as spirited as they come, but some of its ambitions outstretch the film’s execution. The individual segments fit nicely from an atmospheric and content perspective. I just wish the central narrative took more time to shade in its intriguing ideas. Ruminations centered on mental health struggles and the disenfranchised treatment of outsiders ultimately go nowhere, while the film’s central framing device does little to give these characters presence (the ensemble cast is fine, but the characters feel like empty ciphers). At its 85-minute runtime, Phobias is a bit too slight to reach its more meaningful goals.

    I admire what Phobias accomplishes within its genre framework. The quintet of talented filmmakers assembles an enthralling yarn from their limited assets while displaying promise as potential stalwarts in the horror-sphere going forward.

  • Violation: Review

    Violation: Review

    Miriam (Madeleine Sims-Fewer) is visiting her sister, Greta (Anna Maguire) and her brother-in-law Dylan (Jesse LaVercombe). It’s been a while since the sisters saw each other and Miriam becomes concerned that Dylan’s influence over her sister may not be good for her.

    However, Miriam tries to make the best of things despite Greta’s attitude towards her and she gets to know Dylan. They seem to get on well and Miriam starts to relax around him, but later that night Dylan does something unspeakable to Miriam and it sets her mind on revenge.

    Violation is a horror film written and co-directed by Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer. A different take on rape revenge films, Violation doesn’t set up the premise for the film until much later, giving time for the audience to settle in and get to know the characters before the film turns to the grislier horror aspects.

    The problem is that the way that Violation decides to tells Miriam’s story inadvertently makes Miriam an unsympathetic character to support. Sims-Fewer does give a great performance throughout and the film does set up the characters, and the dialogue and chemistry between the cast all feels very natural. It’s just a little troubling as Miriam’s violent actions seem to come out of nowhere.

    Add to this the way in which she enacts her revenge and the audience may start to think that Miriam may be carrying it out a bit too easily.

    Saying this though, the scenes where Miriam gets her revenge are done quite differently from the usual scenes in this subgenre of horror. The audience is perhaps meant to feel uncomfortable and it’s certainly effective where in other films it would be all about the glamorisation of blood and gore.

    Also, thankfully the film does pull away from the gory revenge aspect that other films would revel in, instead showing Miriam’s reactions to what she’s done and perhaps to make the audience think about what she’s done. One violation for another may not be what we consider to be fair, but it’s up to the audience to decide what’s worse.