Lost Transmissions

Lost Transmissions is a drama that follow Hannah (portrayed by Juno Temple), a shy songwriter who realizes her friend/producer Theo Ross (portrayed by Simon Pegg) is not taking his medication and suffering from schizophrenia. Along the way, Hannah is also trying to chase her own dreams as she is hired by musician Dana Lee (portrayed by Alexandra Daddario) to help write music for her next album.

The film portrays Simon Pegg is one of his best performances. I have not seen all of his films, but this is by far the best emotional performance I have seen from him.

Unfortunately, the film is very boring. It follows Theo as he goes around LA dealing with episodes of hallucination and having Hannah trying to save him. I found myself continuously going on my phone or failing to actually stay tuned in because I just was not into the story. So while I thought the film was acted well, I probably wouldn't recommend it - 5/10.

Hats off to Katharine for her directorial debut. She did a great job portraying someone with mental illness. The truth is heart breaking and painful to watch. It's moving and upsetting. Great film to raise awareness about mental illness, something that should become a casual topic yet there still is stigma about it. It was nice to see Simon Pegg in a modest and serious role. He was authentic and accurate. Juno Temple was captivating. Her vulnerability and internal life are beautiful to watch.

This is a heartbreaking story about how schizophrenia destroys a man's life. I find the story very engaging, and very real. It is great to see Simon Pegg in a serious role, and he's convincing in it too.

It begins well with Juno Temple playing an introverted creative who meets Simon Pegg, an extroverted producer. An interesting friendship begins and the audience is wondering if it will result in success, betrayal or failure. Nice.

She then quickly learns of his mental health problems and Pegg's character does a lightning-fast switcheroo into jumble of weak dialogue and fairly generic 'crazy talk'. This is not to say that people with mental health issues don't often share similar problems (hearing transmissions, grand conspiracy, etc.) but those problems seem to be indulged here for no particular reason. The rest of the movie languishes on his deterioration and we're not entirely sure why Juno's character is the one we're supposed to be following. It then dissolves into various critiques of health and public services, which Juno's character is often reduced to spectating.

The acting is fairly decent throughout, though Pegg feels miscast and struggles with some of the material. He's usually good at sincerity, but feels out of place here (and not in a thematic way).

Despite its agreeable message, it is a movie that lacks a strong story and treats its handful of characters far too gently.

This is such a complicated one. And I guess that is kind of the crux of this movie. It doesn't know what it supposed to be. It is not a movie movie about how the health care system fails mental patients. There are only two scenes about that otherwise it is never mentioned again. Is it not about mental illness either. We see mental illness but it is rather an attempt to show us what it looks like than dealing with it the rational of it. But I won't dare to call it a bad film because Juno Temple and Simon Pegg are absolutely out of this world great. Both in their performances and their chemistry with each other. Temple never ceases to amaze me anyway but I would say this is her best role and it is Peggs best as well. Watch it if you love amazing acting or love Temple and/or Pegg.