Dark – 2015 – An interesting persona

It’s been a while since I wrote anything on this blog. You could say that life has caught up with me lately. Poor excuse, but that’s how it is. Shit happens and we need to focus on what important. That’s something the main character in this movie should learn by the way. It’s obvious already from the start that she has a lot of issues. What kind of issues isn’t clear from the beginning but as the movie goes along we note that she has problems with herself. She lacks self-confidence and doubts herself in each and every way. Unfortunately I don’t think this is very uncommon for you women. Or anyone else for that matter. But let’s start from the beginning…

Kate has a relationship with Leah and we are made aware of the sexual tension already in the opening scene. This is also the first time we see tendencies of Kate’s issues. We just haven’t figured them out yet. At least didn’t I. From this moment on it’s really a one woman show film. That is to say that Whitney Able as the character Kate, does most of the screen time on her own. It takes an actress of great skill to pull it off and I believe that se dis a great job with it. I’m fascinated by her persona.

Anyway. When the lesbian lovers split up for the day we get to follow Kate. She lives in a neighborhood that is far from glamour. It’s kind of the slum actually. I don’t think she likes it at all but the main thing is that there is a power outage that affects the entire city, or at least a large portion of it. There are few occasions when we don’t really know what to do, I know that from personal experience, that are worse than a power outage. We so take power for granted in our daily life.

It’s obvious that she get on her own nerves when she has to keep herself company. Her demons grows stronger with each dark moment. She goes about for a drink and some company but when she gets rejected her world falls further apart. She becomes more and more paranoid in her own mind. She cannot distinguish reality from her own mind. She see enemies all around her and the smallest sound is a threat to her security. It grows darker and darker but the greatest darkness is yet in her own mind and in the nightmare she’s about to wake up from.

This is a fine movie. Great acting and skilled direction. I think it’s thrilling most of the time even if the pace might be a little too slow at times. It’s a flick that is far better than I expected. I kind of love it. Really I do! And it gets even better after a few hours, when what really happened has had a chance to melt in. This is a thoughtful movie with a great script!

8/10

Review: Gut - 2012

Gut

Director: Elias

2012

Drama/Horror/Thriller

Something is missing in Tom's life. Every day he goes through the motions, becoming increasingly detached from those around him. His best friend Dan thinks he has the answer, a mysterious video he's got to see to believe. What Dan shows him leaves Tom unsettled, flooding his mind with disturbing images and desires, and binding the two friends together with its ugly secret. As he tries desperately to forget what he saw, Tom's mounting feelings of guilt and disillusionment quickly give way to paranoia and fear. One video soon follows another and another, blurring the line between reality and voyeuristic fascination, and threatening to dismantle everything around them. 

I did not write the above description of the film but I found it being so informative that there was really no need to rewrite something original for the sole purpose of this review. Maybe I would have included that the film that might solve Tom’s problems and fascinates Dan is some kind of snuff-porn where a woman gets cut open with a scalpel. There’s really no need to leave this information out as the movies title kind of gives that away anyway.

The whole atmosphere in this movie within the movie is sexual but there’s no actual footage of sex or sexual encounters. Nor is there any real evidence of sexual arousal by the viewers of it. There is insinuated fascination but not really arousal. This means that the film is not there just to shock us but also to frighten us, which it does over time. To begin with Dan tells Tom that he ordered it online somewhere but later confesses that someone just sent it to him after he wrote his postbox number in some forum.

When Dan gets another DVD, and then another and another we realize that this is not sexual at all. At least not for the viewers. Tom and especially Dan can’t let go of it and feel themselves forced to watch. The fascination gets more prominent but we realize more and more that something about this is totally wrong. (when someone sends us DVDs of women being cut open we should feel kind of awkward don’t you think?).

What good about it is that there is a presence of the question what is real and what is not? Soon the DVDs start showing women that they know being cut open. Here stops the fascination and terror begins. Why are they receiving these DVDs? Who is sending them, and why? Are they even real?

The friendship of Tom and Dan are soon in jeopardy. They cannot support each other more than to a certain point. They just want the whole thing to end. In the end it’s all about mental instability and the need to protect ourselves. Looking out for number one and your own family is the prime directive. Your friends are really secondary!

I was surprised how well acted this was. Neither of them will get an Oscar nomination for their work but they portray the characters very satisfactory. The same thing goes for the directing and the visual effects are very good also! It was an exciting experience watching this and I feel that the suspense was there almost all along, which is truly uncommon for a low budget movie like this.

7/10

Photos by Will Serber, © Gut Productions, LLC