Category: REVIEWS

By Last Caress.

Today BRWC looks at three short films featuring the talents of Philadelphia-born New Yorker Timothy J. Cox, described variously as “the busiest man in indie cinema” and “the Johnny Depp of indie cinema”. I’m the Johnny Depp of independent film review, you know. Well, we’ve both played Hunter S. Thompson. Well, I say I’ve played Hunter S. Thompson, I mean I’ve done a lot of drugs. Well, I say I’ve done a lot of drugs, I mean I’ve gone through two tubes of Anusol this week already, and it’s only Monday. Chafes, it does!

Anyway, the movies:

What Jack Built (Matthew Mahler, 2015)

Jack is building, in his workshed. A cigarillo is clenched almost perpetually ‘twixt his teeth. He drills. He planes. He smokes. He welds. He grinds. He smokes. He pores over diagrams. He rummages for parts. He smokes. Wood. Screws. Hinges. Circuit boards. Motherboards. Keyboards. A mixing deck. A cassette player (remember those?). What’s he building? Pensively, he takes these bits and bobs out into the woods, where he begins to assemble them, running yards and yards of power cords from an outlet. It appears to be some manner of motion-triggered box trap, around which he places cameras through which he can monitor the trap’s success from his workshed. But what is he trying to catch?

What Jack Built has no dialogue whatsoever, no other characters apart from the titular Jack played by our man Timothy J. Cox, the ambiguous ending isn’t quite satisfying enough and, even at a lean eleven minutes, much of Jack’s construction could probably have been pared by as much as half and still maintained the film’s effect. Nevertheless, it’s a strangely intriguing piece; hypnotic almost, like a lava lamp. And Mr. Cox – along with his director Matthew Mahler – still somehow manages to disarm Jack and keep him likeable, and his antics interesting.

Check out What Jack Built HERE

Total Performance (Sean Meehan, 2015)

Cori (Tory Berner) and Tim (Steven Conroy) are on a date. A first date, and it’s going quite well. Cori is explaining to Tim what she does for a living, and he is fascinated. Mind you, he would be; what Cori does is fascinating. She works for “Total Performance”, an agency which hires out actors like Cori to clients who wish to use them, as Cori puts it, as “sparring dummies” upon whom the clients can practice difficult verbal exchanges which they obviously envisage having to tackle at some point in their immediate future: Confronting a cheating spouse perhaps, or an underperforming work colleague, or maybe telling your loving partner that you’re not feeling it anymore, and it’s over.

Anyway, the date ends, Cori and Tim kiss goodnight, and the next day Cori goes about her business, taking an appointment with a client, auditioning for a film role. Upon returning from her audition, she’s handed another client: Tim. But who does he need to confront, and why?

If I’m honest, the conclusion doesn’t quite live up to the reams of potential provided by the build-up in the rest of the movie, but on the whole Total Performance is a good-looking, flowing piece, shot and framed confidently by writer/director Sean Meehan and anchored by the natural, unfussy performances of Steven Conroy and particularly of Tory Berner, the star and standout performer in this short (our man Timothy J. Cox, also with a producer credit on Total Performance, has a cameo playing a CEO who wants to rehearse a scenario wherein he is to fire his best friend from his company).

Check out Total Performance HERE

Dirty Books (Zachary Lapierre, 2016)

High school student David Burrow (Noah Bailey) is the editor-in-chief of the Prichard Hall Gazette, the weekly high school one-sheet. However, with little to report past changes to the school cafeteria output, added to the spiralling costs of producing barely-read printed media, the inevitable has happened and school principal Dr. Bradley (Timothy J. Cox) has called David in to inform him that, regrettably, the Gazette cannot continue in its current form and will have to transition to a much more 21st century user-friendly online blog form or cease altogether. When David passes this on to the other students involved in the Gazette’s publication they’re fine with it; it makes a lot of sense to switch to online media, really. David himself however, is furious. They’re killing the printed word! But what can he do? Well, if he can manufacture some sensationalist news by anonymously committing a series of pranks and then reporting them exclusively in the Gazette as a big mystery, interest will grow as well as readership numbers, and the Gazette will be saved. Hurrah!

But why is David so angry at the Gazette’s impending demise, anyway? Well, Dirty Books isn’t really about the Gazette and neither is David’s ire. Clearly not one of the “cool” kids, David has begun to define himself by his editor-in-chief position at the newspaper, even though said newspaper is little more than a leaflet and the entire Gazette enterprise is simply an after-school club. And in committing these pranks in order to try to save his editor-in-chief self, he’s inadvertently stumbled upon a potential definition of self which is even more tantalizing: The kids are all talking about him now! Of course, they’re not quite talking about him as such because this prankster who has caught everybody’s attention is anonymous but, still! Talking! And if it all eventually falls in on him, which it is bound to at some point, he’ll be infamous and they’ll be talking about him – actually, him – for years! Of course, he’ll likely be ridiculed as a fraud rather than revered, and he’ll have done a fair bit of damage to his academic achievements too but, still! Talking! Let’s just hope his friend Owens (Isaiah Lapierre) doesn’t lose that journal of his, into which he writes everything, including all of David’s confessions of being the Blanchard Hall Prankster, eh?

David’s big scheme for saving the paper and becoming a celebrity in the process is riddled with flaws, however. The “U”-rated pranks he commits are quite lame (when they’re not entirely implausible altogether, such as his moving a bunch of furniture into the cafeteria and arranging it to resemble a living room), and this jeopardizes his conviction that these pranks will pass into school-hall legend as the years roll on, long past his time at the school. And how would these pranks save the Gazette, anyway? Wouldn’t the school just want these items reported upon in the new online school blog? The student body wouldn’t need to read about these pranks in a newsletter at the end of the week, they’d bear witness to them each day as they happened. And David has no guarantee whatsoever that any written reporting of the pranks will be exclusive to the newsletter; anybody at the school could tweet about it to the entire world, if they wanted. But this all further paints for us the picture of David, an unremarkable lad just beginning on the road to discovering exactly who he is and who he wants to be, dazzled as so many are by the bright lights atop the school-student caste system, sinking into an obsession with becoming “somebody” amongst his peers, and suffering delusions of grandeur as a result. “So, this is where I make my exit?” He proclaims, Nixon-like, at the film’s end. “Don’t be so dramatic, David. It’s just suspension,” replies the principal.

Director Zachary Lapierre has made quite a thoughtful piece underneath its gently humorous, light-hearted frippery, making keen observations about the skewed perception of status amongst school kids. Mr. Lapierre’s composition is surefooted and oftentimes Dirty Books is wonderfully evocative of simpler times in our lives. The terrific soundtrack helps greatly in this regard, giving the movie an almost Clerks-like feel here and there. The inexperience of the cast is admittedly something of an issue throughout (Timothy J. Cox excepted) but, whilst Dirty Books is nowhere near as polished as Total Performance, it’s my favourite from the three shorts.

Check out Dirty Books HERE

Desk-bound FBI Agent Nate Foster (Daniel Radcliffe) discovers a new world as he is cherry picked by former undercover agent Angela Zamparo (Toni Collette) to enter and investigate a dirty bomb threat. Imperium takes us into a world of of white supremacy, race wars and skinheads, proving that threats don’t always come from where you expect.

First time director Daniel Ragussis is making a political statement with Imperium. From the beginning, Ragussis is making point that the world’s focus on Islamist violence is counter-productive and hides other potential threats. Yet no matter how true of poignant this statement is, it’s far too obvious. The first thirty minutes felt more like anti-fascist propaganda than it did a film about Nate Foster.

Imperium picked up significantly once this point had been made and it got into the grit of the plot they were trying to uncover, but it still only went surface deep. The characters in this film, particularly young recruit Johnny (Devin Druid) are incredibly interesting characters, yet theirs little depth to their motivation. Even the bomb plot itself only has a surface motivation and it’s very difficult to see why the event has come about in the first place with several of the plotters not even appearing until the final scenes.

Nonetheless, these basic characters are done really well and are faultless in this sense. Every skinhead feels real and even the more hidden white supremacists are believable. Where Imperium does stand out it with Daniel Radcliffe’s character. As an portrayal of how someone so risk averse, and so opposite to those he comes to live with, and even understand, is excellent. Imperium portrays well that to become trusted, you must understand and relate to the people who trust you, even if their political views are wild and they appear insane, you may have more in common than you think.

I won’t be too critical of Imperium. It’s a highly entertaining film, and I certainly enjoyed it. I’d even watch it again. The plot is well placed, the acting and the characters are good. The story is great and it’s delivery without much flaw. I just felt it could have been so much more than it was. Some will certainly feel it’s relevance and feel side by side with it’s political statement, but it was just a little force fed. Imperium is one you should judge for yourself. I don’t think many will hate it, but I don’t think it’ll blow many minds. A good film, not a great one.

Watch the trailer here.

Presented with English Subtitles.

This real-life documentary from director Rokhsareh Ghaemmaghami follows the every-day life of Afghan refugee Sonita Alizadeh; now living in Iran.

 She faces the oppressive traditions of her culture that have been imposed on her by her family. She dreams of a different life and a career as a rap singer; quite opposed to what is expected of her.

There is no set story-line here and the film allows Sonita to tell her own story. It is refreshing to not have the footage broken up with talking-heads however these long, drawn-out sections can at times lose the pace. Where there are interview style sections these are very in-formal and Sonita responds in typical stand-offish teenager style.

Shot mostly unobtrusively and in almost fully ‘fly-on-the-wall‘ style; the film allows the subject to speak for herself and lets us into her world. The story is made perhaps even more powerful and culturally significant not only because it features a female at the centre but also it was shot by a female director.

An insightful look at the real-life of a refugee struggling against the traditions of her culture.

Sonita Alizadeh is an Afghan rapper and activist who has been vocal against forced marriages. Alizadeh first gained attention when she released “Brides for Sale,” a video in which she raps about daughters being sold into marriage by their families. By help of Rokhsareh Ghaem Maghami, an Iranian documentary filmmaker who over three years, documented her remarkable story in the film Sonita, Alizadeh filmed the video to escape a marriage her parents were planning for her, even though it is illegal for women to sing publicly in Iran, where she was living at the time.  After releasing the video on YouTube, Alizadeh was contacted by the Strongheart Group, who offered her a student visa to study in the United States, where she currently resides.

In the wake of the 2011 London Riots, Jamie, a female young offender finds her life hanging in uneasy balance as she’s torn between the love and loyalty of her dangerously possessive best friend, Leanne, and the nurture and guidance of her care worker, Kate. From the overbearing influence of her childhood friend she feels a belonging and sense of family, while Kate offers her encouragement and support of her musical talents, Jamie has to make the kind of decisions that will shape the rest of her life and define the woman she will grow to be.

Setting a coming-of-age drama in such a volatile time for youth culture will always have its advantages from a storytelling standpoint. From Rebel Without A Cause to Fish Tank there has always been uniquely unifying force that compels adolescents to kick back against the societal norms and a seemingly unjust world. When Urban Hymn is at its best, it is managing to encapsulate the vitriol and teenage aggression that ring true to its characters. The lead performances from Letitia Wright and Isabella Laughland are fantastic and provide a believable spite and venom, permanently clashing with their care workers.

Initially, our window into the lives of these troubled teens is through the perspective of Shirley Henderson’s Kate, a mousy, sympathetic care worker who runs the risk of being engulfed by the ferocity of her wards. While Henderson delivers a strong performance I feel it is the time spent with the adults where the screenplay dips into the problematic. Whether it be a dinner party discussion with wine and well-meaning friends, or meetings with the staff of the care home, the topic of troubled youths battling against the class system seems rather fudged. Urban Hymn has some pertinent things to say but occasionally fumbles in delivering its messages. The very nature of the, “us against them”, perspective makes for a compelling middle-class melodrama but lacks the courage to show more nuance in the rebelling teens.

The on-screen development of Jamie’s song writing talents representing her gradual assimilation into wider society and the use of choral works are an interesting choice but one wonders if its implementation is to make the grit and grime easier for the target audience to swallow. The overall message is a little heavy handed but for the most part it comes from a good place. That’s not to say Urban Hymn isn’t worth your time, just those expecting a hard hitting, documentarian style drama should probably look elsewhere.

Urban Hymn is due to be released Friday October 7^th