24 Exposures

'24 EXPOSURES': Two and a Half Stars (Out of Five)

Indie filmmaker Joe Swanberg (who recently made the outstanding 'DRINKING BUDDIES') wrote and directed this ultra-low budget mumblecore/slasher flick starring Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett. Wingard and Barrett are filmmakers too (mostly horror) and have worked with Swanberg before on films like 'V/H/S' and 'YOU'RE NEXT' (which they wrote and directed and Swanberg acted in). Many others in the cast have also previously worked with the three before; like actresses Helen Rogers, Sophia Takal and Hannah Fierman (all in 'V/H/S'). I like a lot of Wingard, Barrett and Swanberg's other work but this film, I'd say, is one of their weakest.

Wingard plays Billy in the movie; a photographer who's made a career out of selling morbid fetish photos (mainly of naked women posed as dead people). His partner is his girlfriend Alex (Caroline White), who helps him hire models and sometimes invites them home for threesomes (with her and Billy). Barrett plays a depressed homicide detective named Michael Bamfeaux, who's been obsessing over his ex. He's investigating the murder of a recent model, that was hired by Billy and Alex for a recent shoot. More girls turn up dead, of course, and it looks like Billy could be the killer.

The film is pretty exploitative; there's a lot of explicit sex, nudity and disturbing imagery. The main storyline, involving the twisted photographer, is pretty disturbing as well; especially because they present him as a pretty nice and mostly normal guy (who just really likes sex and twisted pictures). The movie tries to explore why Billy does what he does but it never really gives a satisfying answer. I did like the attempt though. I admire the movie's ambition and think it could have done a lot more if it wasn't restrained by it's micro-budget and poor production values. I always think filmmakers (and their films) deserve points for trying; especially if they're trying to do something unique and different, like this is.

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"24 Exposures" is a boring, pointless waste of time. It's so bad that I have started to write this review with still about ten minutes of run-time left. I don't want to waste any more time on this movie.

Mumblecore generally feels pretty pointless. I loved some of the "mumblegore" flicks, though, like "Baghead" and "Cheap Thrills". Those were great.

But "24 Exposures" and "A Horrible Way to Die" have all the bad things about this subgenre, and none of the good. They're so unfocused as to be tedious. Suspense requires a sure hand at the wheel. It has to be built carefully. These things barely qualify as movies, they're so slapdash and haphazardly put together.

It's weird how much nudity there is in "24 Exposures". Some nudity makes sense as the movie is "about" (not the right word) a guy who takes pornographic photos of women who have been made up to appear dead. But it feels like every scene has a woman showing her breasts.

This isn't Andy Sidaris or Russ Meyer, though. It's a low budget indie flick, so the women are pretty average looking. And the nudity becomes distracting. You would wonder why they put so much of it in, if not for the fact that very little in the movie seems to have been done deliberately, so underwrought it is, so maybe it just kind of happened that way. Maybe they didn't even plan it. Who knows?

It's tempting to say that "24 Exposures" is "mercifully brief" at only one hour and seventeen minutes. But that run-time just feels so much longer than it is. Instead I would recommend you have mercy on yourself and skip "24 Exposures" entirely. It's for mumblecore fetishists only.

In this sexy thriller a photographer (Adam Wingard) who specializes in erotic photo shoots is suspected of murder when one of his models is found dead.

When starring Adam Wingard and written-directed by Joe Swanberg, you expect AJ Bowen or Ti West to show up somewhere, but not this time. Wingard's directing has been hit and miss, so it was nice to see Swanberg at the helm this time. He knows how to make a simple picture look good. Audiences might get drawn in immediately from the really sweet opening credits sequence, sort of going for a neo-noir look.

Some critics have called this a "soft-core porn", and one threesome scene does come across as quite gratuitous, not to mention the countless other times nudity comes into play. Was this necessary? Probably not. But it does effectively drive home the theme of jealousy, as it puts us right in the middle of the emotion: a photographer, even if completely innocent, runs the risk of making his significant other jealous. And this goes well beyond photography.

Most reviewers were mixed to negative. One exception was Evan Dickson of Bloody Disgusting, who rated the movie 3.5/5 stars and wrote, "As a rule, if you hate what most people consider to be mumblecore, this isn't the movie for you. But if you're open to this somewhat shambolic riff on noir, you might find yourself pleasantly surprised." Regardless of what is "mumblecore" or not, this film stands on its own merits. Maybe the merits are not that strong and that makes it hard for the film to stand, but different viewers may take away different things from it. While clearly not the best in independent horror-thrillers being made today, it is far from the worst.

The film starts promisingly with a protagonist with an unusual occupation - pseudo death photography. He professionally shoots models made out to have died by some violent means.

Pretty novel... OK lead on........

When one of the models turns up no-duff dead, he ends up being a suspect. The storyline then starts to fall apart in very s-l-o-w motion as the cop sent to investigate gets drawn into the subject. That he's depressive doesnt help his objectivity. The storyline is thin and doesnt need an hour plus to play out. The script is non existent and the scenes too disjointed.

Bottom line is if you want to see boobies, watch this show. But if you havent got long to live, dont waste one more hour of your already short lifespan. The girls arent blowaway eyecandy except for Helen Rogers whos big boobies while impressive, unfortunately have begun to lose their fight against gravity.

If you like Joe Swanberg you better forgot this title. The story line don't make sense and the rythme is so slow than even after 14 coffees you'll lost the focus. The naked girls are pretty but that's not enough to keep the interest. A thriller movie as to be built adequately or else it'll lose all it's purpose.

I give only 2 out of ten for the effort but' to the producer and director, please stay away of this kind of movies that require more talent or/and cash that what you can afford.