Something, Anything

SOMETHING, ANYTHING (2014)

This film took me by surprise. In the first few minutes I guarded myself against what I expected would be a sappy sentimental journey, however the story and understated handling of it soon moved into territory that drew me into the silence. Yes, this is another indie movie with a loud, quiet presence.

Peggy, (Margaret), is the female Pretender. She tries to follow the path that is set out for her of supposed happiness. At the conclusion of the film I looked back to the introduction of Peggy's character and appreciate what a nuanced portrayal the actress, Ashley Shelton, gave.

Something/Anything will always be a Todd Rundgren album I love, but now it is also a slice-of-life tale that follows a young woman as, after a personal tragedy and betrayal, she pares down the superficial and searches for sanity and salvation in any sense of the word. The religious aspects made me uncomfortable, as religious aspects do, but they serve here to tell the story of this seeker who is eventualy found by fireflies and true loving friendship.

With 18:18 minutes left in the film a lamp is shown, which is the exact same stained glass firefly lamp that sits on my dresser and has been a beautiful part of my surrounding for decades since I fell for it in a little shop in Chicago. That was a fun bonus for me. If you don't know the lamp in person, it would be impossible to tell that it is made up of images of fireflies -- a lovely touch by the filmmakers who imbued their character study project with this kind of heart all the way through.

This modest indie parable has an interesting premise: 20-something Margaret starts to search for something more fulfilling than marriage and career after her husband lets her down in a monumental way and she's forced to stiff a client to make a little extra profit for her company. The storyline's original enough to hold our interest at first, but Margaret's gradual downsizing of her life is largely carried out in silence, and what little dialogue there is is strictly functional, so the pace begins to drag a bit.

She seems inspired by the example of a friend's brother, a Trappist monk at the famous Gethsemani monastery, but the connection between them is tenuous, and when their paths do cross, the outcome is inconclusive (though not for the obvious reason). This is a film you have to bring a lot to in order to take anything away from it. First-time director Paul Harrill doesn't seem to be able to add much texture to what finally seems like a fairly generic tale, and it may be hard to get involved in Margaret's story unless you're already in total sympathy with her spiritual quest.

Although the movie came out slow at times (mostly in the beginning) , I felt it was moving as the character did. Peggy was someone that would be quiet and listen often rather than speak first thing. I believe this movie did such a fantastic job at showing how you might feel, being pressured into a particular way of life. As a Midwesterner native myself, it hit me fairly well. The small steps she took in deciding to be someone else were moving.

I prefer a movie that isn't all over the place and keeps you thinking about what the character is dealing with. And this movie coincided with what i'm dealing with and helped me think on life and what we live it for.

Thought provoking, life provoking, and overall splendid watch.

The movie was recently added to Netflix recently. I had never heard of it, but I gave it a shot as Nexflix had rated it 4 of 5 stars. Wow did they miss on this movie.

When I watch a movie I like to be told a story. The best movies leave you with some kind of message. It can be a deep or complex message like the one I received from "Slingblade" that sin is not black and white. Or it could be a simple message like the one I got from "Transformers" that big, living alien robots blowing up stuff is cool.

I could not follow the story in this movie. This 88 minute movie had less dialog than average comic book. Without the dialog one must rely on the images to understand what is happening to our character. Yet the editing and direction are terrible. There are countless scenes where I found myself thinking, "What happened there? Did I miss something?" I would end up rewinding to repeat the scene, and I found that I did not miss anything. "Oh well, perhaps something will happen later that will make sense out of that scene." Nope. Either the director did not set up the shot correctly, he did not get his actors to preform in a manner that would convey the message he intended, or the editor did not use the right clip to convey the message to the viewer.

The Netflix summary offers a little more info than the one here on IMDb, so I don't think I'm offering a spoiler here. It says the newlywed suffers a tragedy and leaves her husband and successful job on a personal spiritual journey. That synopsis appealed to me. Unfortunately, I was never able to understand what the lead character was looking for. I could see that after her tragedy she began to question whether the typical "American Dream" of a big house, a fancy car, and a large family was the best that life had to offer. In her spiritual journey she started seeking the Christian God. But by the end of the movie I was only left with questions about what it was she was seeking, or what she was going to do to find that inner peace, or whether or not she even found it!

The character development is totally unbelievable. The script and the director did a terrible job of justifying her decision to leave her husband. If the director was trying to make the husband look like a heartless jerk who was more concerned about his career and getting ahead than his marriage and his wife, he did a terrible job.

Here is more terrible character development. At one point in the movie we find our lead character was a competitive cheerleader in high school. Have you seen these girls on ESPN? The are full of pep, full of energy, and they always have bright eyes and huge smiles. Yea, some of that is merely acting for the judges, but you can't be a competitive cheerleader unless some of that personality comes naturally. Our lead character is morose, slow, and quiet. If she was once a cheerleader it's as if she is now on too high a dosage of Xanax.

I am a person of faith and I thought I was going to see a thought provoking movie about finding an inner strength to overcome adversity. All I found was a boring, slow movie with bad writing and character development that had no message of any kind for the viewer. I would have given it one star, but this would be a good movie to watch to put you to sleep.

It has a good vibe in a landscape of bombastic movies that glorify superficiality... that said, I do with the lead had a better wig!