Waydowntown

One of my top 20 movies for sure.

The characters are what make this movie. And the touch or surrealism. The premise is that four coworkers make a bet that whoever is the last to remain inside wins a month's salary. Until then they live their entire lives inside this bubble.

One of my favorite props is that even the smokers can live their entire existence indoors; they smoke in these little tubes inside the building.

Some of the characters are a kleptomaniac boss, a suicidal cubicle slave, a directionless young office worker, and the initiator of the bet, who had succeeded living indoors for something like a year.

OK, I'm not from Calgary, but I headed down there for the film festival to check this one out. I spent an afternoon in Calgary's Plus 15 system being totally, utterly, lost. Then I saw the Alberta premiere of waydowntown. Finally a film from the prairies that doesn't involve hearts breaking in wintry farmhouses! Clever use of digital Beta, 35mm, and security cameras. Brilliant use of colour. Exceptionally well acted, fine deadpan performances from all. And most importantly, WELL WRITTEN. Smart, funny, unpretentious. Gary Burns rocks.

What a wonderful little movie! Almost every office worker can relate to the atmosphere of staleness in an office tower. Interesting make-up job they used... dark on greenish pale faces made everyone look like walking dead zombies, which from a little office work experience, is not to far from real life in some places. This movie kind of reminded me of Isaac Asimov's planet, Trantor, in the Foundation novels and his depiction of New York hundreds of years in the future in the Robot novels where Asimov refers to as living in "caves of steel." (Interestingly, Calgary's skyline has been described as one of "steel and glass")

However something somewhat disturbing is that much of North American society will grow more and more comfortable indeed with living and working indoors all the time. This may have been alluded to when one of the characters (I won't give it away), stepped outside for a refreshing breath of of air and finds the outside air instead very unpleasant to breath from the city's pollution. It's a scary thought in that if the way things they're going now with the environment continuing to deteriorate, many of us may have to find refuge waydowntown ourselves.

Oh, I watched this movie the day before I started my first fulltime job in an office setting. I just graduated from university with a commerce degree. Man, how depressing since the character, Tom, is also a commerce grad with his first job. I think it'd be really funny if they showed this movie to all commerce students. Maybe then they wouldn't worship corporations as much as they do now.

Alas, (to quote a local weekly) Waydowntown has been the best argument I've seen to date AGAINST moving to Calgary!

This movie was hilarious! Simply put, it is purely great humour. Practically anyone will like this movie for it's many very realistic characters who all seem to go insane! This movie sits somewhere between reality and fantasy, for it uses both aspects in a beautiful way, somehow finding a perfect point between the two.

It's about these people who make a bet that they will not go outside of this connected office building complex in the heart of downtown CITYX which looks sorta like Calgary. Anyhow, it shows their lives, interactions, and trying to live a human life in the strange box they call home... It makes for a weird, but interesting scenario, and the main character's ant-farm clearly parallels the film's main scenario.

This film not only has excellent acting, but the directing was great too. The script was intelligent and well written, and everything about this movie screams WELL DONE! I mean, for the small little Canadian budget they had, they did excellent! I wouldn't be surprised if this movie becomes an underground classic. Or gets rereleased by a bigger company to rake in the dough at the box office.... frankly, I am surprised how little anyone knows about this movie. Well... See this movie if you havn't yet! It is not to be missed! I reccommend to all, for you will all love this movie. SEE IT!

P.S.

Oh, and the superhero scenes are just awesome! You'll know what I mean! *L* :) Ahh, just thinking about this movie makes me want to start laughing, it's the funniest thing I've seen ever..... in a movie at least. Watch and enjoy. Don't miss it!

A hilarious psychological comedy where 4 Calgary coworkers bet on who can go the longest without going outside. The exaggerated personality degradation and hallucinations are funny and successful at drawing the audience into their warped world. There is a glass ant farm that is shown often as an allegory to the people living in the channeled tubes of sky walks & high-rises, and it serves a narration at a couple points. The actors did convey a sense of disorientation from having been indoors for 24 days, but it seemed from their behavior that they were indoors somewhat longer. The story takes place in one fateful day when several big events occur that they can't fully handle because of the bet induced stress, but a critical enlightenment is also realized. In this 18 day low budget shoot, the location and background information are left fuzzy intentionally as are the costume changes that occur randomly. This was shot in DV which made the post production effects much easier on a budget, so they are used with good results throughout the story. Film maker Gary Burns feels that the sky walk system "ruined down town Calgary," and even the title is part of his film statement of "modernization gone terribly wrong." This movie is worth going to see if you can find it.