Length: 13:23
Logline: A guy invites a work colleague around and inadvertently leaves her alone with his collection of recorded dreams, one of which is about her.
This is an excellent concept for a short. There is a nice sci-fi element to it but it's used subtly and this is really a comedy about conflict. We're not kept waiting about and get a quick and concise explanation of the whole dream recording thing early on which answers most of our questions and gets it out of the way. The dream recorder isn't the focus of the plot here but is merely a devise (or MacGuffin) which helps drive the plot.
The dialogue has a nice naturalistic bumbling way about it. There's stuttering, overlapping delivery with nice tonal shifts. All of which is exemplified by both performances by O.T. Fagbenle, playing James and Gigi Mbatha-Raw, who plays Erica. The down side is that the pace suffers slightly for all the spread out talk and it also feels like it's being stretched out somewhat in order to facilitate rising tension. This isn't a laugh a minute comedy and only has the occasional joke in amongst dialogue. The humour comes more from the scenario and the awkwardness between the two characters, both of which are likeable, relatable and easy to watch.
As is fast becoming the norm, production standards are high. There's good picture quality, nice editing, varied shot composition and a fitting soundtrack. I can see why the filmmaker decided to have Erica watch the video in a darkened room in order to reflect a change in tone and to give us something different to look at but again, this decision also brought me out of the story to question why she'd go to all that trouble when there was a time pressure on her to watch it before James returned. There is also a point where it looks like Erica is just watching a blank blue screen which doesn't quite fit her later recollection of the video.
Overall, it's the whole reading someone else's diary idea done in a fresh new way and with a nice twist at the end. Well worth a look.
Best Bit: Original idea.
Worst Bit: The yeti dream stuff could have been better.
Final thought: Good way to use up your old VHS tapes, that.
Read a condensed review of this film on Twitter here.
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