The Room In The Elephant

Greetings again from the darkness. Sometimes a kid is the smartest one in the room - or at least the most perceptive. Director Tricia Lee's movie opens on Nicole who is placing post-it notes all around the house ... and I do mean all around. Each note is a reminder to do or not do something. Our first thought is that either she's going on vacation or she's helping out someone who suffers from Alzheimer's. It doesn't take long before Nicole's young daughter flashes in and nabs a couple of the notes.

CM Landrus is credited with the screenplay from an original story by Kimberly Jentzen. Soon enough we figure out that Nicole (Ingrid Rogers, CARLITO'S WAY 1993) is a rocket scientist and her smart young daughter Katie (newcomer Lila Bahng) is trying to be just like her ... building her own rocket ship in her room. Katie wants the post-it notes to reinforce her cardboard rocket.

When the husband/dad (Brent Bailey) gets home, Nicole tells him the doctor has delivered bad news. Nicole struggles with how to tell her daughter, and it's at this point where we realize that the smartest person in the room can be a 7 year old - even if a rocket scientist is present.

A film about family. Beautiful in profound sense. For the interracial status. For the great performances, for message and because it is a film who you feel, scene by scene. Short, touching and just beautiful.

I could only make it halfway through this short film. It feels so sappy and false; the musical cues, the mediocre acting, the false emotion. I really wasn't into this. Not sure what "revelation" the kid has. This is something you would expect to find on midday TV before quickly changing the channel. Exploiting the concept of terminal illness for your "art" is also pretty gross!