Basilisk Stare (2003)

Directors:

Michael Kamieniak
Mis Kamieniak

Writer:

Mis Kamieniak (writer)

Genre:

Drama | Short

Plot:

A film about obsession, sexuality, devotion and paranoia. |

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

  (Credited cast)

David Wenham	...	Dave
Jared Turner	...	Spike

Runtime:

6 min (original version) | Canada:13 min

Country:

Australia

Language:

None | English

Color:

Color

Company:

Australian Film, Television and Radio School

Psychosexual drama in which obsession, devotion and paranoia color the inner world of the male psyche. (2002) -courtesy Sundance Channel

Basilisk stare is a truly subversive film. Not until you leave the cinema can you fathom what you just saw. Not until sometime later can you verbalize what it may have been. And in some cases, several days may pass before you see the film for what it is. This is a story of Ray, a man whose desire to fulfil his fantasy destroys him. This film lunches us into inner-space of the male psyche in order to see the way the modern male constructs sex. It shows the influence of technology on the modern gaze and modern male's interpretation of sex. In a way indicative of common psychopathology that may no longer appear as such because everyone already has it. It has become normality. Innovative in every way, Basilisk Stare has no dialogue, rather it allows the audience's inner dialogue to create its reality. The films images are exciting and disturbing at the same time. This is achieved through the experimental use of split screen, which allows for the pitching of two images against each other creating a sense of uncomfortable excitement (on the one hand) mixed with the voyeuristic need to know what will happen next (on the other). Its pacing lures the viewer and we become an accomplice, and like the main character get lost in the 'reality' only to have it implode in the last moments of the film.