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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Masterwork!, February 24, 2009
This review is from: Back Against the Wall (DVD)
Wow. This film blew me away! I was a fan of James Fotopoulos from "Zero" and "Migrating Forms", but this takes things to a whole new level. Basically, this an art film, but more in the Eraserhead vein. Employing beautiful black and white 16mm photography with a bizarre, noisey soundtrack and some abstract images, the film slowly (probably too slowly for most people) unravels layers of a lingerie model and the corrupt people she deals with. Just a beautiful film, structurally, thematically, with some truely shocking and chilling imagery handed out in small doses, not to mention a few scenes of beauty (love the constant shots of the seagull flying on the shore). Brought a tear to my eye. In a day and age where idiot hacks like Guy Maddin are put up on pedestools while people pretend to know what "art film" means, this guy is doing something completely fresh and intelligent and DIFFERENT. This is one filmmaker to watch, especially if you're into cinema that is a bit different than the norm, and I think he needs to be supported. No-budget filmmaking at its finest!
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4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Dull, plodding, perverse, and poorly made, January 16, 2004
This review is from: Back Against the Wall (DVD)
This black and white film is about on par with _Big Brother_ in its plodding insipidness. The film is hard to follow through the endless still-camera shots of pointless and redundant conversations and the director's obsession with masturbation. The characters aren't just quirky, they're farcical--one even appears to have joke store teeth. Fotopolous casts unengaging actors as characters neither intelligent nor interesting in a story that, really lacking any clarity, appears to be about a woman whose situation forces her into a career as a porn star, which she must to masked after her face is scarred. I think. I'm all for ambiguity as long as your mise-en-scène, camerawork, or editing is interesting, but sitting through this at the Naptown Underground Film Festival, which also had many of Fotopoulos's masturbation-obsessed shorts, was a major chore. If anything, this is more an effort at being offensive than an effort to make art.
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