Fourteen

The people who made this movie really had their act together. Truly outstanding performances by the two lead actresses made it easy to forget that their characters on screen were fictional. The supporting cast also added color and substance to what otherwise could easily have been a boring story about a deteriorating friendship.

Dan Sallitt directed Fourteen. Among other accomplishments he demonstrates that fine entertainment can be offered without relying on explosions or psychos with guns to mesmerize viewers.

Congratulations to all!

I don't like to be critical of independent film because I admire the DIY approach to art. This film suffers from a dreary palate (digital) and rough sound. The actors all sound like they're reading lines. The budget is listed at 95,000 which seems high for what's on the screen. If they said it was made for 3,000 I would believe it. As for the story there isn't much of one or characters that are interesting or charismatic.

Mara (Tallie Medel) and Jo Mitchel (Norma Kuhling) are lifelong best friends living in Brooklyn. Mara teaches kids and aspires to write. Jo is tall, beautiful, and flighty bordering on mental instability. This is a story of their lifelong friendship and its difficulties over the years.

It's a fascinating indie. The two leads are well matched to their characters. At first, it looks like a run-of-the-mill twentysomethings mumblecore indie which is perfectly fine. Then it starts sprinkling in some hints of the darker substance underneath. That's the greatness lurking inside this story and that's its ultimate power. The indie filmmaking does hold it back a bit. Dan Sallitt is obviously still experimenting on his shots and some of it doesn't work. It serves no purpose to hold the camera stationary for minutes on the train station. It may or may not be trying to insert time passage into the story. There are better ways to do that. The camera work is not professional enough but the story is well worth telling. It's very powerful in its observational nature.

I loved this movie! I haven't seen a movie like this in years. It reminded me of 90s movies like 'Slacker', 'Ghost World', 'Swingers', and others. The acting by all cast was respectable. I love the single camera, one take stage performance style. It's how actresses and actors demonstrate their craft. I also like that style because that's how we see the world. We don't see the world in closeups and quick cuts.

The movie depicts a realistic relationship between women, who've known each other for a really long time. We all know a person who we've known for years that struggles. I had a girlfriend just like Jo. I did all I could to try and get her off pills. She ended up having a kid. Then overdosed and lost custody. We try to help people but our own lives get full and complicated and it gets to hard.

When these people we care about pass away, it hurts, because we hold on to the good memories of them. Time passes and they become a distant memory that we're grateful for.

I personally find the long takes to be interesting. It gives me time to look around and appreciate the scene. The question becomes how long can a single camera angle last before viewer gets bored. I personally think a minute or two feels about right.

I enjoyed watching the movie. I'll probably watch it again sometimes. I don't know who I'd recommend it. It's a peaceful movie. The sound is good, locations nice, I loved it.

For a film to work you have to offer your audience some form of entertainment. If story or plot isn't the priority, then you have to deliver pretty great dialogue. If you can't deliver great dialogue then you have to put on show high quality acting. This film has none of those three important components.

If you can't offer those essential three, then you better offer some sort of thrill or visual feast. This is clearly not that type of film either. So what you left with is basically a cheaply shot, amateurish play with no substance. It's simply poor writing.

Example, rather than show the woman becoming more dysfunctional we get to hear it through a friend. And not even in a type of revealing story way but in a 'I think she needs to see a doctor something's going on' way. It's exposition. The number one worst rule of screenwriting. I question the motive of critics and wonder which film they've seen.

Long takes can work wonderfully too but here they offer no artistic reasoning. It wants to be high art. It wants to be the indie films of the 90s but it's really very shallow.

The only redeeming quality is the lead actress. She pulls it off but only just. The rest reveal their shortcomings from the opening moments. There are far better low-budget films around that haven't received the type of publicity this one has. God knows why.