Embers

A film about memory that will trigger future memories for me of its many haunting moments and images. An incredibly ambitious accomplishment of genuine independent filmmaking (both in theme, design, and execution). The always delightful Jason Ritter (here in a heartbreaking role; a simple beat he takes with a water bottle is among the most poignant scenes in recent cinema), and some thoroughly confident and brilliant actors new-to-me whom I hope to see again (Iva Gocheva, Roberto Cots, Greta Fernandez) made this well worth the viewing, along with the surprise of discovering a director (Claire Carre) who will surely deliver many fascinating films in the future.

People probably expected something very sciency, with special effects, with the big contagion that gets solved by the brilliant scientist, but it is nothing like that. It just describes, in a pretty slow pace, the aftermath of a global contagion that makes everybody amnesic. People that love each other forget the other exists at random moments, smart intellectuals fight all day to remember who they were by reading their own books (man, that should be another movie altogether!), rich people have built bunkers in which they educate their children who, unfortunately, reach adolescence and become stupid, and so on. There is no storyline, no explanation, no closure. Nothing too brutal, nothing too bloody, just people being people without being themselves.

It is not a great movie, it will not be remembered throughout the ages as a classic of direction or acting or storytelling, but it's not bad either. It's a "what if?" scenario played close to the end and well interpreted.

After a global neurological epidemic, those who remain search for meaning and connection in a world without memory.

On its surface, "Embers" is a very simple movie. We have a series of people who have lost their memory to varying degrees. Some can remember for a day, some only minutes. A few seem to be able to push the limits a little bit further. Good science fiction is taking reality as we know it, and pushing the edges out just a bit to what is not yet actual, but possible. And "Embers" succeeds in that endeavor.

Writer-director Claire Carre was fully aware of the importance of keeping the infection idea grounded in reality. "I did a ton of research, looking at different neurological case studies, and specially looking at the lives of people with amnesia… The characters in the film suffer from symptoms similar to the type of brain damage you might get from viral encephalitis." Thus, what we see in "Embers" is entirely possible, as unlikely as it might be that amnesia would occur on a (presumably) global scale.

Whether intentional or not, the film evokes the idea of location as a character in its own right. The filmmakers went out of their way to find just the right settings: an abandoned church in Gary, Indiana and an underground bunker in Poland are two prominent examples. The bunker shown in the film is not a set, but was built as part of the Nazi line of defense during WWII. The spiral staircase scene is real: the stairs run ten stories deep with over twenty miles of underground tunnels to explore. The locations serve as characters because they tell as much of the story – perhaps more – than the humans, showing how much the world has fallen into decay.

Within the simple plot structure, we are left to find subtle messages on our own. At least two dichotomies are evident: Hope versus Chaos, and Freedom versus Safety. Freedom versus Safety is a bit more obvious, as the character of Miranda and her father have a discussion touching on these themes. After years of isolation, she longs to be free, to search for her mother or just to see new surroundings. Her father, perhaps wiser, tries to explain how she is the safest she could ever be: one step outside, and she risks falling victim just like everyone else. So which is the right way to live: alone and safe, or free and struggling?

The character of Chaos is in the form of a man, but could just as easily be a metaphor for chaos in general. The world, left to its own devices, will inevitably decay and turn to dust. He is part of that process, just working at an accelerated rate, killing and smashing as he plows through life like a hurricane. Countering him is Boy, who stands as a metaphor for hope. Just as Chaos wanders, so does Boy, and we get the impression that maybe, possibly, he has not been affected by the virus. Because he is mute we can never fully gauge his memory, but he seems to comprehend the passing of days better than anyone else. If there are more Boys (and Girls) in the world, it may not decay and chaos may not reign after all. This one character (Boy) inverts the whole narrative from a tragic, depressing tale into one of hope.

"Embers" is a complicated film disguised as a simple one. For anyone who wants to see a film about a glimmer of hope in a world at its lowest, this is the film for you. "Embers" premieres July 22 at the Fantasia International Film Festival.

This is a movie that will grab your attention. You will develop interest in the characters and the story that they are in. However, the movie doesn't take you anywhere and that seems to be the glaring problem. All movies need an arc. Stories are suppose to have some sort of end. While the beginning and even middle of this story draw you in and end falls flat. While the acting in the movie is above average and while production value is very good the obvious whole is too much to look past. What we are left with is the script that simply has no idea where it is going. This is why this movie is rated as 6/10 on the site.

We get an interest in these characters and their story but it doesn't actually have any interesting story to tell you about them. The whole movie is simply a waiting for the climax that never comes. As if they pieced together scenes to generate interest but then take it nowhere.

I love the concept, the acting, the production. But this is a script that needed a lot of work before being shot. As the story needs to be more than simply the effects of the disease. We are expecting more from these characters story lines. Stories about nothing tend to be nothing anyone wants to watch. The last thing a movie should do is leave the audience wanting in a bad way at the end. I give it a 7/10 which is more than most rated it. Because there is a fair bit of quality work here. It's not that the movie isn't interesting. It is. It just lets you down after such a good start.

Took me a while to figure out how to rate this thing, which is always a good high gauge on my barometer of film excellence. Many reviews wanted this to go somewhere. But the complete absence of memory in stark reality, says you wont, because you wont remember where to go. And for those who still have memory, is it worth having if you are isolated? And if you have intelligence, how do you fight this plague? It also gives a stark look at the ID. Who are we without memory, when all we have left, is our basic nature? I have seen many memory loss movies, but this is by far the best. The acting is superlative, on all fronts. Just like any film buff, I like a good conclusion. But I was happy with this negative one, because of the very nature of the subject matter. In this case, the beginning was the ending, and well, visa versa.