Static

Static is a well shot, fantastic story. Not a standard hollywood picture that deserves all of what little recognition it has. If you live in Chicago, you can rent it at Facets video rental. (They have some great rare movies) Mark Romanik has such a great visual eye. I anxiously await One Hour Photo.

Basically a very simple story is stretched to the extreme. No one believes they can see heaven on a modified television, except the inventor and believer. The characters are quirky, and fairly well developed, but they really have very little to do except revolve around Keith Gordon and his preposterous invention. Bob Gunton and his family of survivalists are way up there on the strange scale and almost seem like they belong in a different movie. The ending is especially weak, and is both unsatisfying and totally unbelievable. Nevertheless, "Static" gets points for originality, even though the presentation is not fully developed. - MERK

"Static" is a precious film. It's a well kept secret, the kind of far-out gem (like , say, Talk Talk : "Spirit Of Eden") that will always escape classification. In a word, it's weird.

Visually, it belongs to the white walls, new wave, ambient American minimalist wave of "Sex, Lies, And Videos", "Bodies, Rest And Motion", "Parents", or the cult Hal Hartley films. The cherry on the cake has to be its soundtrack, complete with sublime atmospheric synthethizer waves by Japan.

The story : something magical happened in a small community ...except noone "gets" it, and a fairly disturbed young man can't get to communicate his sublime vision, and share his surreal "invention". What he has come up with is mind boggling... and noone else recognizes it. Past the suspenseful first half, the film veers into another, more tragic, direction ("Sugarland Express" ?), as he takes on the world. Weird, wacky, wonderful.

Details (like the half-melt crucifix collection, the survivalist, his kids' alien masks) abound, creating a suitably subtle poetic atmosphere. Add to that the fascinating presence of Amanda Plummer, who adds a doubly poignant subplot (returning "home", and sympathising with the loner), and you have a true cult classic of the eighties. -Other possible recommendations : "The Reflecting Skin" , or "The Darkness Of Darkley Noon".

I saw this film over 10 years ago, a few months before my father died. It was on late-night TV and I was fascinated by it - it remained in my mind, though at the time I didn't know how significant it would become. The general story dealt with a young man's "glimpse" of heaven through the static on his TV screen. A few months later, on the day of my father's funeral, I was sitting in my car with my son and my car radio appeared to "start up" without prompting; all I could get on the radio was "static noise". (This is all true.) I took this as a message from my father as the film had been so haunting in my mind. It wasn't frightening, but very comforting. The radio continued in this way on and off for a number of weeks until the car was scrapped. I extracted the radio itself and still have it now. I would love to see the film again and have tried on ebay without success. I can't remember much about the acting or direction, but surely the point of a good film is if it lingers in your mind? I haven't seen many films since then that have had this effect.

"Static" is the rarest of gems. I am glad Mark Romanek went on to make my alltime favorite music video (Nine Inch Nails' 'closer'), because had he not amazed me with that video, I probably would never have been interested in seeing "Static". When I finally did see this film, I was even more amazed at how great it truly turned out to be, and wondered why it was that I had to discover the film all by myself rather than it being directly recommended to me.

The story and directing is very captivating, as I soon found myself intently watching every second of the film to see what was going to happen next. Keith Gordon (who co-wrote the script with Romanek) was dead-on in his portrayal of Ernie Blick, an out-of-place young man in small town America with an obsession over his new 'invention'. It also took "Static" to turn me into an Amanda Plummer fan.

The movie's soundtrack alone is entertaining. No wonder Romanek went on to a career in music videos as he obviously has a wide knowledge of music. I mean, what can you say about a soundtrack that effectively includes songs from both The The and Elvis?

I can't help but believe that "Static" is one of the roots of today's massive independent film movement. All of the key elements to current popular indies can be found in "Static": limited budget, dark humor, a disturbed main character, psychologically-driven drama. The film's ending is original and surprising even by the standards of the modern 'twist-in-the-end' craze. What made me appreciate "Static" that much more is that it still didn't sit you down and spell everything out for you at the end with a narrated flashback montage (like too many movies do). Instead, it's up to you to figure all out yourself.

If you are a fan of today's popular independent films - especially Pi, Memento, or Donnie Darko - then please do yourself a favor and take a timewarp back to '85 to find out where these films originated from. See "Static".