Future Shock

This movie is a compilation of three separate movies. The last one is "Mr. Petrified Forest", which is the Masters Thesis film of Matt Reeves, which he completed for his Masters in Film at USC. He fund raised, wrote, directed, cast, edited, etc., every aspect of "Mr. Petrified Forest". Subsequently, USC sold his Masters Thesis film, which was incorporated into this theatrical, commercial film. No one connected with "Mr. Petrified Forest" received any monetary compensation, including the actors, crew, director, writer, editor, etc,. when it was incorporated into this commercial film. USC should not have sold it!!!! Perhaps there are copyright infringement issues. It is an outrage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One woman, by herself in a house for 45-minutes of screen time, doesn't sound like a formula to hold you on the edge-of-your-seat... but FUTURE SHOCK is truly as thrilling as they come! Writer / star Vivian Schilling takes on those little fears we all suppress, and enlarges them to terrifying proportions, so don't watch this film alone!

This film is not a masterpiece and I shall not pretend that it is. However it does offer some surprisingly fresh and effective ideas and is overall and enjoyable watch.

Segment one is surprisingly tense for a film with a clearly tiny budget. The lead actress' performance is strong enough to sustain the segment, the camera-work creates a good feeling of isolation and vulnerability, and the downplayed musical score adds to the sense of dread throughout. This is the simplest short and uses this to its advantage.

Segment two veers into a more darkly comedic tone. It works due to the entertaining performances of the leads and the effectively surrealist atmosphere. However overall this is the weakest segment, mostly due to feeling out of place with the rest of the film.

Segment three is the best, due to its less goofy attempts at dark comedy over the last segment. It actually offers a fairly entertaining and in depth character study and offers some fairly complex ideas on the nature of mortality. The writing is good, the acting is solid and the humorous moments are well integrated.

Overall I was very impressed by this simple yet effective anthology. Its low budget charm and snappy writing really created an enjoyable tone for this one, and I highly recommend it, despite its quirks.

I knew FUTURE SHOCK's packaging was a scam, as "The Roommate" short subject has made the "tournee" circuit a couple of times since 1987. However, this three-part anthology is still pretty good.

"The Roommate" is by far the best segment. Bill Paxton excels as a squirrely, abrasive con artist who barges his way into a roomie relationship with meek apprentice coroner Scott Thompson. He rips off, torments, and abuses Thompson. Thompson tries to kill the unwelcome visitor, with ironic results. The black humor keeps the film from being a thoroughly unpleasant experience. James Karen has a welcome supporting role as one of Thompson's co-workers.

The least successful entry, "Mr. Petrified Forest," was a USC master thesis and is predictably filled with arty composition and paper-thin sentiment. The title character is a "chicken little" type who waits nervously for a predicted earthquake to hit LA. It never hits, but he falls in love with another paranoid. He tells the story from a heavenly "wait station," as doctors on earth frantically try to revive him from a mysterious accident.

Another examination of paranoia, "Jenny Potter," stars and was written by interesting actress Vivian Schilling. She lives in a Malibu house decked out like a fortress, with silent alarms and a computerized security system that talks. Her husband (Brion James) leaves her alone one night and her nightmare fears of being attacked by dogs edges into her real world. The episode is scary but pointless.

As you might expect, the weakest link in FUTURE SHOCK is its framing sequence, in which doctor Martin Kove interviews each segments' protagonists. He uses a funky strobe light thingie to hypnotize them and lead into each of the stories.

Future Shock (Eric Parkinson et al., 1993)

This could have been a fantastic movie. It's an anthology film set around the office of a therapist who's come up with a new method of hypnotherapy. Over the course of the day, he sees three of his truly screwed-up patients, subjects them to the hypnosis, and waits. We get to watch what happens during the waiting.

The writing is just shy of good. The acting is just shy of good (save a few memorable performances, most notably from Bill Paxton, back when his contract still allowed him to play sleazy bad guys; he's as good and rowdy in here as he is in Near Dark). The production is just shy of good. Unfortunately, it all adds up to bad, albeit bad in a kind of endearing way. The potential in each of these stories tends to get in the way of the sheer, mindless enjoyment. The exception is the last story, "Mr. Petrified Forest," a shaggy-dog story about a guy having a near-death experience who can't remember how he got outside the gates of heaven.

Ah, the potential. It's worth a free viewing if it pops up on TV, but don't go out of your way. **