About a year ago, I spent a cold spring day at the Collingwood Arts Center acting under the direction of Jake Extine, who was shooting scenes for his movie, Apothecary's Cage. I didn't have a complete script, just sides for my scenes. I had little conception of what the whole film was going to be about. 

From time over the next twelve months, I would ask Jake when the film was going to be completed and released. He always replied that he and his crew were still editing it. I began to wonder if it would ever be finished. 

Last night, though, I attended the film's premiere at The Lillian Gish Theater at Bowling Green State University. And to say it was well worth the wait is a gross understatement. I was amazed by what he and his team had done.

Apothecary's Cage is a dreamlike exploration of what it means to be an artist. The main character, Lucas, is a young man who is confined to a wheelchair and does not speak. He loves to draw, but his unfeeling mother and his sadistic doctor/teacher violently discourage him from doing so. Instead, he is given drugs and forced to watch disturbing "educational" television shows all day. As his hold on reality starts to slip, he is visited by a silent man wearing a bird-like mask that looks like something out of a Hieronymus Bosch painting. Eventually, Lucas's frustration and rage overwhelm him and he finally takes steps - literally and figuratively - toward transfiguration.

The film is gorgeously shot. I remember filming my first scene with Jake, a one minute bit in which all I had to do was react to dialogue between Lucas and his mother, get fed up, swear, and walk out of the room. It took three hours to get the lighting right to Jake's satisfaction. For someone like me who is more used to the rhythms of theater than those of film, it seemed like an eternity. But now I understand. Something glows in every scene of the film - a face, a prop, a part of the set. And that doesn't just happen.

Pacing was perfect. The film never felt rushed or sodden. There were longish silences when Lucas was alone. There was a brilliantly edited sequence when a drugged-out Lucas is overwhelmed by the images on the TV; the scene cuts back and forth rapidly between the television and Lucas struggling to free himself from his wheelchair. Those cuts were just the right length: quick enough to convey Lucas's torment, but not so quick that the viewer lost sight of what was happening. 

And speaking of that scene, Jake and his team devised the "educational" television programs that Lucas was forced to watch, and inserted them onto a television playing in Lucas's "school." There were angry talking heads, gross insects, disturbing expressionist cartoons. This is technically complex stuff, but it looked seamless.

The film was smartly cast. The young man who played Lucas conveyed a complex set of emotions without speaking. A tilt of his head, a glance through an anguished tangle of hair, and a defeated slouch of his body showed sadness, frustration, condescension and anger. 

The actor who played the doctor/teacher looked like Lenin - deliberately, I assume - and walked the line between cartoon evil and smarmy manipulation wonderfully. 

Sara Lipinski Chambers brilliantly played Lucas's domineering mother with a stony face that radiated distaste and frustration. I recall from the filming being almost intimidated by how quickly she created her character. It was inspiring.

The nurse, a minor character in the film, went about forcing Lucas to take his medication with clinical indifference to his suffering. 

I've only seen myself on film once before. It's an interesting but slightly uncomfortable experience to study one's own face and body language. Overall, I was pleased with my performance. In a scene where Lucas is taken to task by both his mother and father, I was clearly the subservient parent, taking my cues from my wife and pretending to a sternness I didn't really possess. I rocked back and forth subtly, suggesting that if Lucas is somewhere on the Autism spectrum, he may have inherited the trait from me. And I got the only laugh in the film. In a heavy movie like this, a laugh is a good thing.

The film ends on a hopeful note, a kind of dance that suggests that artists may struggle, but will ultimately prevail over censorship, disapproval, and indifference. I thought of Emma Goldman's quip: "If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution." In Apothecary's Cage, the revolution is internal-Lucas is not himself anymore-and the dance is tentative but triumphant.

It's always difficult for unknown indie filmmakers to get their projects seen. This is one that clearly deserves to be. I hope that Jake and his crew can make that happen. It's better than most of the films I've seen on the festival circuit. Here's hoping!

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Apothecary's Cage

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