D'Agostino

Writer/director Jorge Ameer continues to make fascinating little films that dare to go where few others even contemplate. Asked to review the Unedited Proof of a film is both exciting and frustrating: exciting because the viewer gets to see all the ideas in their various forms before being edited into a final product, frustrating because the film comes in bit and pieces that dilutes the impact of the story. But there is enough here to see that once finished this strange, somewhat macabre story should have appeal with audiences.

Allan Dawson (Keith Roenke) is in a seemingly flatline relationship with live-n girlfriend Sylvia (Torie Tyson, better known for her singing than her acting skills): something is missing (other than the apparent age mismatch between the young Roenke and the more mature Tyson), a fact that becomes apparent when Allan is notified that his grandmother has bequeathed him land on the Greek Island of Santorini. Allan departs to investigate the surprise, thinking he will immediately sell the property to better his financial status. But once he arrives in Santorini he is mesmerized by the beauty of the island and is introduced to the inherited home by an agent Niko (Jorge Ameer). As Allan settles in he hears strange sounds and discovers they come form a locked closet containing a human clone - filthy and whimpering. The naked male is named D'Agostino (Michael Angels): apparently heading on a transatlantic voyage at sea from an Italian lab to America, D'Agostino is a human clone left for dead at the shores of Santorini. This lost cargo, commissioned by wealthy individuals for organ transplants, is abandoned as the freight cannot be recovered.

Allan cleans the clone, feeds him, keeps him on a leash like a pet animal, an slowly becomes attached to D'Agostino. When D'Agostino goes missing Allan is frantic and searches for his lost treasure along the shores of the island - the place where the lost D'Agostino sits in reverie. Through a series of dream sequences we watch as Sylvia becomes less important and D'Agostino becomes the extension of Allan he has always longed to discover. There is a surprise ending the will take the audience off guard and Jorge Ameer handles this neo- science fiction ending very well.

As is usually the case with Ameer's films, the visuals are of utmost importance. Here cinematographer Zach Voytas captures the flora and fauna and the generally breathtaking beauty of Santorini to great effect. The musical score, the reason for this release of a memento of the film, is a mixed bag, too often covering the dialogue of the film, but the ingredients are there and hold great promise. It is bizarre, challenging, and in line with Jorge Ameer's fresh take on cinema.

Grady Harp

Jorge Ameer is a polarizing filmmaker. No doubt about that. It is obvious in the score above. Either way, he is one filmmaker filled with some very interesting ideas worthy of attention. As for D'Agostino, .I've never seen anything like this film before and I watch a lot of movies. However, in my personal opinion, to discover D'Agostino, you really have to pay attention to the details. The clue to unraveling this drama, thriller, sci fi is to study the characters actions as they engage. As they say "the proof is in the pudding." This is one of those films that either you get it or your don't. I notice the score for the film is low, yet when I looked at the demographic, it seems like men respond better to this film. Maybe I'm male inside, who knows (lol)... but I liked it. Getting this film, means paying close attention. There is a lot going on here. There is the obvious, then the stuff beneath the surface that is eating away at the main character. Allan Dawson, a very hot and handsome Keith Roenke, is a man on the edge. On the edge to a break down as people have driven him to his wits ends. His home life isn't any better. Fertility problems and a nagging fiancé is the perfect formula to shove Allan to the breaking point with disastrous consequences. Then comes an outlet, Allan must go to Greece to take possession of property left by his grandmother.

He arrives and realizes, he's by himself and a new sense of freedom takes over him. Enters D'agostino into his self-discovery and things now seem to go his way. Figuring he's been pushed around for a long time, he sees D'Agostino as an outlet to mold his new clone friend and return the wrongs done to him. The film unfolds in a progressively dark manner until things get really ugly. On one hand you wonder how a man has been driven to the brink of madness in such a way he would choose to do the things he does with D'Agostino (don't worry I won't give it away). The answer is when life and society has been too overwhelming for him, it't time to take action. Time to settle the score. That is the underbelly of this film. It's got many things rooting for it and one of them are the many hidden messages...It's a if the filmmaker were trying to tell us many things at once right beneath the obvious. It's a film which merits at least one more watch.

The Allan character has been put to together with such detail that once he meets D'Agostino, he seems to have found his automatic pilot where all the awful things he does seem to come naturally to him.

This is a multi genre film with many messages both good and bad. It question personal morals as well as values. D'Agostino seeks to defy the commonality of normalcy. It is a condemnation of how people live and how they treat other, specially our valuable possessions may it be human or not. It is a case study worthy of much debate. The story also seems to take place in some futuristic version of reality. It could very well take place ten to twenty years from now, yet the situations in the film remain relevant to today's happenings. It's about the results of what we choose to do and D'Agostino is a clear example of what happens when you are so lost in your own world that you loose focus of what's appropriate and what crosses the line. There is no morality in D'Agostino. At least not with the Allan character. He seems to live in his head, and for him, there is no line. His actions does keep you thinking about the many things he could have done differently had he conformed to society's expectations. For one, I would have called the cops to report this "missing person". But again, if you did, there would be not story, or at least not the way it is set up for interpretation. There are many profound messages regarding our reason to be, how we treat each other, and where we are headed as people having to deal with each other in a changing world. There is also cause & effect happening here...lots of it. Yet, by the end of the film and its shocking conclusion it becomes clear... if you mess with nature, nature messes back and will always wins. While I was watching the film, you can't help to wonder if we are the victims of what we know to be true, a trait learned from our forefathers, or the culprits for what we instill onto our future generations and/or our young. After thinking about this film long after watching it, I couldn't help to wonder about filmmaker Jorge Ameer's intention... was to dragged us through this very strange multi-layered odyssey through the dark bowels of human nature or show us how screwed up we have become as a society or maybe how our priorities have become progressively skewed by greed and the need for personal fulfillment. For those reasons, I am still thinking about D'Agostino. I give the film a 8.7/10 for it's complexity of story, originality and for its breathtakingly beautiful scenery.

Hmmm. So here's the gist. "Allan" (Keith Roenke) is living in the USA with his older girlfriend "Sylvia" (Torie Tyson) but after six years they are really just going through the motions. Then he gets an unexpected call telling him that his grandmother has gone and left him an house on Santorini. Off he duly goes to assess his inheritance and it's all rather beautiful. Then one night he hears some scratching and upon investigation he discovers a naked man half starved and unable to speak. Now what would you do at this juncture? Doctor? Police? Ambulance? Nope, "Allan" decides to wash this rather grubby fellow and treat him like a dog. Feed him from a bowl, chain him up with a collar, indeed the word 'inhumane' just leaps to mind - especially when there are some very thinly veiled sexual connotations incorporated into this rather savage indictment of a dominating character. Wait, though! It gets better. It transpires that, after a quick search on Greek Google, that this lad - whom he's christened "D'Ago" was being used for organ donating; fell off his ship in the Aegean Sea and was pretty much abandoned by his creators. Yep, he's a clone! What now ensues took what little credibility that was left and drowned it. There are so many ridiculous scenarios, not least when "D'Ago" escapes and goes meandering across the island, stark naked, and then returns to his dog-collar providing master. Is the purpose here that the disgruntled, and frankly supremely arrogant "Allan" is supposed to be looking after this captive and starting to learn about himself? Is he supposed to count what blessings he had with his girlfriend or is he really just an irredeemable and odious character whose definition of kindly behaviour is to treat his new friend as if he were an animal. I must admit, though, that pretty tasteless as this was I did find it curiously compelling. I felt sure that something was going to happen - and it did! Thing is, what we get for a denouement is just as unsatisfying as most of the rest of this rather shallow assessment of humanity, sexuality and preposterousness. It is fitting that it's set in Greece where the ancient pantheon was riddled with gods and heroes whose mothers, sisters and goats were all the same creature and upon which quite possibly auteur Jorge Ameer (who frequently and persistently knocks on the door to say hello) used as his basis for the screenplay, but in any case this film makes little if any sense and is a long old watch to leave us with such an unfulfilling sense of ambiguity.

This is a re-imagining of a Greek tragedy from the amazing perspective of provocative filmmaker Jorge Ameer. Once a beautiful young god was so spoiled and arrogant, he was sent to Earth by his grandfather Zeus thinking that perhaps, living with the mortals, he might learn a lesson in humility and other good character traits. Alas, London, where the young god, who now calls himself corporate executive Allan Dawson, was cast out, was not a good fit. He became more arrogant, calling people he passed by on the streets fat and ugly. Allan also has an Oedipus complex, finding a fiancée who was very attractive but looks old enough to be his mother. And, oh, he became so bored out of his mind! Watching from the heavens, Zeus and the other Olympian gods were disheartened and decided maybe a change of scenery would help.

Allan Dawson was sent by the gods to Santorini, Greece, under the guise that he inherited a beautiful beachfront property from his grandmother, probably Hera. To help him navigate this new stunning world and watch over him, the gods sent a minor deity Niko. The gods also sent another minor deity, who resembles Allan, who is also egocentric like his uncle Narcissus. What better ploy for Allan to learn about himself and return to Olympus, a changed, better god, right? Wrong! Instead, Allan treats this demi-god cloned to his image, like a dog, keeping him on a leash, humiliating him, and basically making him his "b-tch"! Well, Zeus and the gods have had it! They cast the fierceness of their wrath on him! The punishment was twisted and completely shocking, but sometimes, to teach a lesson, you have to scare the living sh-t out of that pr-ck! Do you think Allan learned his lesson? Only time will tell.

D'Agostino. From the very provocative mind of Jorge Ameer. Superbly and unabashedly acted by Keith Roenke, Michael Andricopoulos, Torie Tyson, and Jorge Ameer himself. Stunning cinematography by Zach Voytas.

The "gay interest" movie genre basically falls into two sub- categories.

On the one hand, there are movies which altogether lack any pretence of artistic merit: they are badly acted, badly staged, badly costumed, and badly filmed, with a screen-play completely devoid of any literary quality. Their only redeeming feature is that they usually have a cast of hot young men, who show plenty of flesh.

On the other hand, there are the "art house" gay movies, which absolutely reek of production values. These tend either to be cast with older, fatter, and/or uglier actors; or, if a pretty boy finds his way on to the set, he resolutely keeps his pants on.

D'Agostino is a rare exception to this dichotomy. The two stars – Michael Gordon Andricopoulos (aka Michael Angels) and Keith Roenke – are both exceptionally handsome: indeed, more handsome, in my humble opinion, than the smooth-skinned and pumped twinkie-boys who populate most of the gay soft-core porn movies.

And there is no shortage of flesh on show. Andricopoulos/Angels is naked in virtually every scene in which he appears. Whilst Roenke keeps his clothes on for much of the film, he obviously has no inhibitions about shedding them when the script calls for him to do so. There is only limited overt sexual interaction between these stars, but the entire plot throbs with implicit homoeroticism.

The acting, costuming, sets and cinematography are all first-rate. But what is most surprising is that this movie has a plot which is as competently crafted as it is intriguing. It is one of the few "gay interest" movies which I would bother with just for the story. Perhaps the plot-line is not entirely original, as it could be described as a gay version of the ancient story of Pygmalion and Galatea, from Ovid's narrative poem Metamorphoses, in which a sculptor falls in love with a statue which he has carved. But even that derivative theme is handled with startling originality.

Allan Dawson (Keith Roenke) is a city-based business executive, in a loveless de facto relationship with an older woman. He has recently inherited his grandmother's estate on the Greek island of Santorini, and takes the opportunity to abandon both his professional and his domestic complications by relocating to this island paradise.

Meanwhile, D'Agostino (Andricopoulos/Angels) was washed up on the shore of Santorini and taken refuge in Dawson's recently-acquired property. D'Agostino, it emerges, is the result of a cloning experiment, commissioned by men of wealth solely for the purpose of harvesting organs for transplantation. Lost overboard in a maritime accident en route from Europe to the United States, he has been left for dead.

When Dawson first discovers D'Agostino, he is apparently bereft of human qualities. Locked in a cupboard and covered in his own excrement, D'Agostino walks on all fours like a dog, and seems incapable of rational thought or intelligent communication. But the relationship between Dawson and D'Agostino gradually mutates, from that of master and hound (or master and slave), to one of mutual support and affection. I will not spoil the final twist, but it is quite unexpected.

Movies this good do not come along very often. It should be savoured.