Agent Orange

AA visually interesting short film (an Amazon.com commercial to be specific) that tells the story of a girl dressed to the nine in orange who lost her goldfish and is pursued by the boy desperately wanting to give it back. A tender love story ensues, fade to black.

Tony Scott proves he can come up with some funky imagery (think about sitting at a subway stop after taking an unhealthy dose of some illicit hypnotic drug and you will see what I mean). I would venture to say 'Agent Orange' is for fans only but may be right up the alley of the music video savvy general populace. This eight minute drug-fueled romance S10 rates a 7 out of 10.

a 7 out of 10.

There is a line between art and business, especially in cinema. Sometimes the line is fine, sometimes it is thick, and sometimes the line is blurred beyond recognition. 'Agent Orange' is a part of a series of short films/commercials commissioned by amazon.com, which are obviously inspired by BMW's 'The Hire' series. The films feature a multitude of products available on amazon's site. At best, they are still a perversion of the art of cinema. On the other hand, Tony Scott's work with BMW in their cross-promotional effort "The Hire" is commendable. When a filmmaker has but one restriction - your film has to feature a car - the restriction is so minimal it can be a situation where a little compromise breeds creativity and originality, or on par with standard studio interference to the artistic process. I think this is very true in the case of "The Hire" - the filmmakers successfully infused original ideas and concepts into the tired car chase genre and they were able to take advantage of the rare opportunity to produce some highly-entertaining and well made short films. But when you're forced to feature a handful of products within a short few minutes, you've sold out. Shame on you Tony, this year you had a hit feature with an academy award winning actor that was well received - why in god's name would you want to do something like this? In addition, the film is very perfunctory, either as a result of the complete commercialization of the film, or that Scott merely did it for the money - it looks like a student film trying to emulate Scott's style. The disjointed editing/fast cutting technique Scott has used consistently for the past few years certainly works well in his last two films "Spy Game" and "Man on Fire" but is completely absurd in this corny romance.

Tony, you're better than this.

I thought that movie was a good attempt at directing and incorporating many of the products sold on Amazon.com. Unfortunately, it was just that. Throughout the movie, all of the shots were choppy and jumped around, a cool effect if used properly (which it wasn't here). This effect is great for occasional jumps and was good for when the train pulled out of the station and when the two made eye contact, but it felt out of place and annoying for the rest of the film. Also, there was no dialogue throughout the entire movie. Although this isn't necessarily a problem, the one time that there should have been dialogue it was replaced with corny cartoonish bubbles above the actor's heads. So unfortunately, I cannot say that I was overly pleased with this attempt at a short film. Oh well. I would however suggest amazon's first short film, the portrait, with Minnie Driver. It gets two big thumbs up from me.

While thousands of Amazon customers may be motivated by seeing short movies for the first time, this set of advertising "shorts" lowers the standards of what people should accept or expect from a short. Tony Scott's shots were interesting, and I enjoyed the lighting, but the jumpy cuts became old fast (even in a short).

Billed as a silent short, I'd hoped to be dazzled purely by the visuals. However, Agent Orange isn't a silent short, simply no dialog. Still, good visuals, and I thought the soundtrack was additive without being distracting.

Similar to most of these Amazon shorts, the plot was unsatisfying. Amazon! Shorts can tell good stories, even if they exist primarily to sell merchandise (it's the future of TV too). The original plot point hinted that the goldfish would be returned, perhaps as an icebreaker to meet the girl. At the end, no fish, no icebreaker, just instant life-long love. Part of my problem with the ending is that the casting and the clashing wardrobe distracted me. I felt sad watching the sloppily-dressed youngish Orange Boy mooning over the stylish, seemingly more mature Orange Girl. I cringed at the unearned ending. (Regarding my age comments, becareful judging those book covers ... if my Internet research is correct, he's several years older.)

Nice to look at, but I'd only recommend it to cinematographers or directors.

Seeing this film reminded me a lot of those certain moments when one sees someone else and just the tiny moment becomes burned into the mind. One can almost obsess over that moment and what one could have done to follow-up on it.

The editing and cinematography help advance this theme by being rather jumpy and dissolved (both with editing, focus, and general mise-en-scene). The orange is the most effective tool in this film, helping make things make more sense than if the largely useless close-ups were the only thing used for dramatic effect.

Unfortunately, this films style is excessive and also kind of works against its theme as well. While such moments in time, in my experience, are rather surreal, they don't tend to be as jumpy and chaotic. Instead, they seem more foundational, like a pause instead of a jump.

Of course this is assuming this movie is meant for that theme, when of course it's just an Amazon product in its own right. In that sense, this film is entirely useless. It doesn't do anything for Amazon, it doesn't do anything for Tony Scott, it's largely irregardless.

Best to take it as if it's a short with a story and a theme and see if you like how it portrays that theme. Otherwise don't bother.

--PolarisDiB