For the Plasma

I saw this film at a local film festival, and I have to say, it's awful. The acting is flat, the editing is janky, the lighting is sub-par, most of the dialog is poorly ADRed.

Yet, for some reason, I totally loved this film. It's bizarre, quirky without being pretentious, baffling but in a way that doesn't frustrate you. It's charming, it has this unique feel to it that just makes you want like it. It like something you'd see in a motel room at 1am on a public access television station. It's like if Wes Anderson directed a 1988 student SciFi film at his family's summer cabin in Maine, screened it once at student film festival, then threw it in his uncle's storage locker only to be found by a public access TV producer in Toledo Kansas. It feel like something you weren't meant to watch, and in that way it makes you feel special for watching it.

We live in an era where "cult movies" aren't really that much of a thing anymore, but I feel like this is going to be a cult movie if only because I'd totally be willing to join that cult. I'm totally going to buy a hard copy of this film (if one ever becomes available) and show it to all my friends, most of who will probably say "why the hell are you showing this to us?" and I'll go, "BECAUSE IT'S AWESOME!!!"

It started out slow. The acting was absolutely terrible--very stilted and wooden. I assume on purpose. I thought, okay, the plot is going to get interesting. I was wrong. Almost nothing happens. It's a total waste of time. Do yourself a favor and spend the hour and a half reading a good book. Or even a mediocre one. It'll be a better use of your time. Ugh!

It's like Twin Peaks and The Station Agent had a baby, but that baby is still learning to walk and talk and is several years off from being able to write with any semblance of fluidity that could be considered good, and that baby tried to remake Pi.

The delivery of dialogue by the old man-well, by pretty much everyone-and, just in general, the dialogue itself, often had me laughing.

I almost turned it off in the first five minutes, but persevered and actually found it oddly enjoyable. And while it definitely isn't a good movie, I kind of felt like their may have been an interesting idea somewhere that got lost along the way.