Here’s something I snagged on a certain circuit lately—from director Matthew Ninaber comes a freshly premiered piece that offered a seemingly stylized take on a Basic Instinct-like tale of murder and seduction, framed perhaps with some commentary on the online world of selling oneself in front of a camera. Did it pan out, or is it something better off fed to an actual hyena?
Well, for one, the filmmakers knew what they were doing on a technical level at least—the lighting is appropriately stylized for a somewhat over the top gritty thing like this, and the framing is for the most part nicely done at least. The editing…well, they’re going for an anachronic order thing, which sometimes gets a bit confusing even when someone like Nolan does it, and mores here, but regardless, in terms of the nicely grisly effects on offer and the like, they certainly succeeded on that.
Our story follows a pair of detectives piecing together the story of a young woman (Storm Steenson) who gets into a totally-not-relationship-we’re-just-friends-with-benefits thing with Kristen Kastner as a cam girl with a past. Things soon escalate into violent territory, and there is at least one slightly squeamish part that actually made me think we were going to see a commentary on trauma and internalized exploitive mindsets passed on, questioning whether we’re talking about someone who simply was browbeaten into thinking this is how things are done, or something else?
…no, not quite. It’s just that people are crazy, that’s all. And of course there’s some implications with our character best not dwelt too much upon. And with that you end up pondering some of the other oddities, like the fact that our murders involve people insulting our lead online, yet conveniently are all within driving distance?
While not completely worthless, that left this one a bit of a disappointment, though at least Ninaber and co seems like someone who’s better paired with an improved script. There’s no need to rush and track this one down.
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