User reviews

The quiet young "Sam" (Tommy Finnegan) arrives at what looks like a casting lunch for a Joanna Hogg film with his mum and dad. It's a grand big country home with loads of buzzing activity and people milling around effusively greeting one another like long lost friends, whilst supping wine, some al fresco dining and.. well I'm sure you get the drift. This young lad, though, he stays slightly on the circumference of the occasion. He's there in body but you feel not so much in spirit. Towards the end of the evening, we discover that it's a birthday party for his mum (Eve Best) and he is to make his own speech - but, let's just say that the illusion of the day's upper-middle class Elysium is soon precariously balanced! It does look good but there are too many cast members to detract from what is essentially the rather ponderous journey to a thirty second denouement that works, but only - for me, at any rate, because the rest of it is about as uninteresting an observation as I can think of. A shock for the sake of a shock? Worth a watch, you can decide.

Watched through the eyes of an unhappy young boy, Sam.

Sam remains apart from the seemingly idyllic setting of a family celebration; all sunshine, overlapping enthusiastic conversations, al fresco lunch and general all-round cheerfulness, with the odd humourous jibe thrown in.

Sam is there with his larger-than-life dad, who seems to try to hog the limelight, a trait that his family know and love, and his softly spoken unassuming, sweet mum.

As the film plays out the underlying tensions in Sam's world with his mum and dad are hinted at with a dramatic and no holds barred revelation from Sam himself, which leaves everyone speechless.

This is haunting and thought provoking; you learn enough about the larger and central family in its short 17 minute run time to make the issues being dealt with impactful.

Highly recommend.

This is a beautifully shot short film that's almost like a fly on the wall tone poem as we share a boy's experience of a party at a posh family mansion. Except something is not right with Sam, he is experiencing something else underneath and we find out what it is in a gasp worthy and (for me) very satisfying final moment. It did not feel alienating seeing the life of a family who are a million miles away from anyone I know because you see it through the eyes of a character who himself is somewhat detached from things and drifting through it with his thoughts in other places and seeing things that others don't see. This hooked me in subjectively and I enjoyed it a lot.