Ben is an art student who works in his local Sainsbury's to pay his bills. As with all his colleagues the mind-numbing work makes time go even slower than it normally would and each of them deals with it different ways. Some cut off all contact with clocks, some mess around and try and have fun but for Ben it is different. His knack is to freeze time dead in its tracks and embrace the freedom this gives him a freedom that his creative side and appreciation of the female form takes full advantage of.
Someone recommended the film Cashback to me and, when I discovered it was originally a short film I decided to watch it first. The film is a game of two halves and I'm not entirely sure how it all fits together. The first half is a perfectly amusing bit about the realities of a menial job, one where you do the same thing over and over again and cannot escape the reality that it doesn't matter what they do. This reminded me a little of Employee of the Month in the way that those in the supermarket find to pass the time, playing games or other little knacks. In this regard the film is amusing but not hilarious and I was assuming that the film would mine this vein harder for its punch line.
That it didn't do this is not a problem but what it did do didn't fit with the tone of the first half. What the film becomes is Ben freezing time to mostly undress women and appreciate their bodies. It is presented as an artistic pursuit but it felt a bit odd to me to see the character of Ben undressing women without their consent and it made me wonder what the point was. The problem with it is that it doesn't have a strong point to this to back up the suggestion that it is artistic and not just weird and smacking slightly of misogyny. Instead it falls back into a punch line related to the first half of the film but not one that ties to this sudden venture into female nudity.
The end result is still amusing but I'm not seeing what about this got it Oscar nominated. It has some good ideas but it doesn't do enough with them to deliver on the potential. The comedy stuff isn't done with enough humour and imagination, while the artistic stuff isn't fully realised, leaving it feeling a bit weird with what it is saying/doing with the bodies of unaware young women. Distracting stuff though and I will be looking at the full film to see what Ellis does with more time and resources to expand upon this.
Someone recommended the film Cashback to me and, when I discovered it was originally a short film I decided to watch it first. The film is a game of two halves and I'm not entirely sure how it all fits together. The first half is a perfectly amusing bit about the realities of a menial job, one where you do the same thing over and over again and cannot escape the reality that it doesn't matter what they do. This reminded me a little of Employee of the Month in the way that those in the supermarket find to pass the time, playing games or other little knacks. In this regard the film is amusing but not hilarious and I was assuming that the film would mine this vein harder for its punch line.
That it didn't do this is not a problem but what it did do didn't fit with the tone of the first half. What the film becomes is Ben freezing time to mostly undress women and appreciate their bodies. It is presented as an artistic pursuit but it felt a bit odd to me to see the character of Ben undressing women without their consent and it made me wonder what the point was. The problem with it is that it doesn't have a strong point to this to back up the suggestion that it is artistic and not just weird and smacking slightly of misogyny. Instead it falls back into a punch line related to the first half of the film but not one that ties to this sudden venture into female nudity.
The end result is still amusing but I'm not seeing what about this got it Oscar nominated. It has some good ideas but it doesn't do enough with them to deliver on the potential. The comedy stuff isn't done with enough humour and imagination, while the artistic stuff isn't fully realised, leaving it feeling a bit weird with what it is saying/doing with the bodies of unaware young women. Distracting stuff though and I will be looking at the full film to see what Ellis does with more time and resources to expand upon this.