Broken Windows

Three days, four women, life altering decisions which could affect rest of their lives.

Broken Windows is a drama featuring four women Sara (Larisa Oleynik), Katie (Sarah Thompson as), Amy (Jennifer Hall) and Beth (Sara Jane Nash), who are at different places of life but equally dissatisfied. Director Tony Hickman explores about waking up in the middle of life and craving change. The four stories come together at the birthday party of a deceased grandfather, where all the drama unfolds and reveals the story of their discontent.

The movie is "real"; it is about the nuances of life; about grief, discontent, hurt and the burden that people carry in themselves and the way it shapes them.

The film has done a wondrous job being an independent film. The whole crew from writer, director to actors, everyone has done an amazing job; the ordinarily of the film sets it par with real life, topped with an equally strong performances by characters. The background music, the muffling acoustic is a beautiful choice. I loved the In Light of Recent News by The Outline.

Corri English, Devon Gummersall, Jonathan Murphy, Jason Winston Georg, Michael Gross, Kyle Brandt complete the movie with equally impressive performance.

The movie is adorable. It is not a typical box office flick; it has the element of realness that may make it look ordinary and tedious. Hence I won't recommend it to everybody but those who like insightful and rather straightforward, "real", element in a drama.

The creator of this work obviously is trying to be different. He has created a jumbled mess of several intersecting lives that offer no real insight into any of the characters. People come and go and do things in front of the camera without any apparent rhyme or reason.

I think the time would have been better spent trying to focus on two or three of the characters and developing them some more. Some of them actually seemed to be interesting.

In summary, this film could have been very good had the writers actually tried to create a plot and some possible resolution (positive or negative) to the characters' issues.

It seems to me this film is not for everyone. But I adored it. Maybe it is because I tend to like films that tell stories that don't have infinite ends. It's a film about life, it's real. People in it fight and then make up, people grieve longer than two days, they sometimes hurt each other without saying sorry. It gives you space to imagine parts of it. It doesn't tie up every loose end.. well because life doesn't tie up all loose ends. It's about three days and you cannot expect to have all the answers after just three days. Broken Windows is a film that makes you think, makes you put yourself in these character's places and think like they do, feel like they do and understand why they are the way they are. Yes, I do admit, even I thought parts of it were strange and didn't seem to have any purpose, but all in all I liked it.

I saw this movie at a festival last year and liked it a lot, and I wanted to see it again before I wrote my review, and I'm sold. I liked it even more the second time around. There are so many little things to pick up on and it's definitely one of those films that you notice new elements with every viewing. There isn't a lot of contrived situations, it feels more real, which I personally enjoy in a film.

The DVD commentary tracks are great as well. I myself am interesting in the film-making process, and they gave a lot of good info about that.

I would highly suggest checking this film out. It's not your big budget studio type of film, but it is emotional and interesting.