From the little bit that I had heard about this film prior to seeing it - I really wasn't expecting to like NAILS. I'm not a huge art-house/cyber-punk film lover, and most of that material is typically lost on me - but this film exceeded my expectations. NAILS combined elements that I enjoy to make a visually interesting, semi-coherent, metaphor-riddled, splattery film that is definitely one of the better entries in this type of genre...
A man (known only as The Hit-man) begins driving nails into his brain as a way to rid himself of grotesque recurring visions. After the first nail "hits-home", The Hit-man experiences an almost revelatory clarity of vision and begins to see the world as it really is. This leads to more "experimentation" with his grey-matter, first bordering on, and then falling full-fledged into obsession to change his perception of the world around him - which leads to violent and devastating results...
There isn't really much that I didn't like about NAILS. Stylistically, it plays out as a mix of ERASERHEAD and TETSUO: THE IRONMAN with a decent dose of gore thrown in. A few things that I really liked about it - first off, it wasn't over-long. I like the fact that the director kept it to 60 minutes and didn't try to draw this concept out to "feature-length". I've seen a lot of films lately that are far too long and seem padded with too much filler, and they don't retain your interest. That's not the case here. I also thought that the transition from gritty black & white footage before the self-trepanning, to an almost surreal neon-colored world was very effective. The special FX, though kind of poor at times, actually fit quite well with the overall bizarrity of the film itself. I also appreciated the fact that although the film is open to interpretation - it is also relatively easy to follow in terms of the themes of "hollowness", soullessness, changes of perception, reality vs. consciousness, etc...and the film works on a somewhat narrative level, as at the end, everything is summed-up and explained relatively smoothly - something that isn't done in a lot of the ultra-bizarre art-style films. I personally feel that this is definitely one of the best that I've seen in a genre that I don't particularly care for. It definitely won't be to all tastes, but strange-cinema fans will more than likely enjoy this one. I enjoy this director's style, and am anxiously awaiting Iskanov's future projects, VISIONS OF SUFFERING, and especially PHILOSOPHY OF A KNIFE - a film that will deal with the Unit 731 atrocities made "popular" by the cult-splatter "classic", MEN BEHIND THE SUN. Considering that I use a sort of "sliding-scale" when rating different genres of films, I honestly have to say that for what it is, NAILS is damn near perfect...9/10
A man (known only as The Hit-man) begins driving nails into his brain as a way to rid himself of grotesque recurring visions. After the first nail "hits-home", The Hit-man experiences an almost revelatory clarity of vision and begins to see the world as it really is. This leads to more "experimentation" with his grey-matter, first bordering on, and then falling full-fledged into obsession to change his perception of the world around him - which leads to violent and devastating results...
There isn't really much that I didn't like about NAILS. Stylistically, it plays out as a mix of ERASERHEAD and TETSUO: THE IRONMAN with a decent dose of gore thrown in. A few things that I really liked about it - first off, it wasn't over-long. I like the fact that the director kept it to 60 minutes and didn't try to draw this concept out to "feature-length". I've seen a lot of films lately that are far too long and seem padded with too much filler, and they don't retain your interest. That's not the case here. I also thought that the transition from gritty black & white footage before the self-trepanning, to an almost surreal neon-colored world was very effective. The special FX, though kind of poor at times, actually fit quite well with the overall bizarrity of the film itself. I also appreciated the fact that although the film is open to interpretation - it is also relatively easy to follow in terms of the themes of "hollowness", soullessness, changes of perception, reality vs. consciousness, etc...and the film works on a somewhat narrative level, as at the end, everything is summed-up and explained relatively smoothly - something that isn't done in a lot of the ultra-bizarre art-style films. I personally feel that this is definitely one of the best that I've seen in a genre that I don't particularly care for. It definitely won't be to all tastes, but strange-cinema fans will more than likely enjoy this one. I enjoy this director's style, and am anxiously awaiting Iskanov's future projects, VISIONS OF SUFFERING, and especially PHILOSOPHY OF A KNIFE - a film that will deal with the Unit 731 atrocities made "popular" by the cult-splatter "classic", MEN BEHIND THE SUN. Considering that I use a sort of "sliding-scale" when rating different genres of films, I honestly have to say that for what it is, NAILS is damn near perfect...9/10