Grape Soda (2014) User Reviews

A Surprise!

[SchylerSilvey · 10/10 · 29 September 2014]

Initially at first glance I was willing to turn away and ignore this short little gem however, being that I dislike the soft drink, the title stayed stuck in my head until I finally decided to push play and thus found myself surprised.

The film opens up slow, slower than most short films with a shot of a fridge and some guy pulling into a driveway to what we can only assume is his home. Once he enters you then begin to see what makes this short film so great, you see wine, strawberries and hear a shower running. The only clue you get that this isn't normal is the look on Mark Ashworth's face and the awkwardness that comes from his posture and body language without a word being spoken. The silence is pushed even further when he sees the man of whom enabled his wife to cheat and when the silence is broken it is merely a sentence but a powerful sentence at that.

This subtlety is wonderfully repeated throughout this short as the emotion builds and builds to the point that you can't help but wonder how Mark Ashworth's character hasn't completely lost it as life seems to be turning against him at every angle.

In the second to last scene of the film you see his wife in front of a fridge with letter magnets that she used to form the obviously incomplete sentence "uck you leukemia," to me this sends a powerful message saying that the very thing that split them apart was the very thing that could keep them together which is confirmed by the final scene of the film of which is home footage of their daughter having a blast with a grape soda in hand.

"Grape Soda" is one of the best short films I have ever seen, to my surprise it was a great work of art and deserves more attention. It left me wanting more from not only it's story but it's well drawn out characters and talented cast.

How to deal with loss

[Horst_In_Translation · 6/10 · 27 September 2015]

"Grape Soda" is a bit of a random title and almost has a pretentious touch to it, but this is a movie about how to deal with the loss of a beloved one. Last year. Justin Robinson wrote and directed this 18-minute short film, in which we follow a man during his personal and professional struggles and also see how his relationship with his wife/girlfriend is suffering from the tragedy that happened. As a whole, I thought this was an okay movie, but sometimes maybe even a tad too melodramatic. I liked the scene with the angry guy calling, maybe my favorite as it shows how the protagonist just doesn't care anymore as if he is dead inside. Okay acting, solid writing, no moments of true greatness unfortunately that would get me curious about Robinson's or Ashworth' other work, but not a bad film by any means. Recommended.

bitter

[Kirpianuscus · 14 October 2018]

Its taste . It remains, long time after the final credits, in memory. A film about loss, so well crafted than it seems a sort of revelation of the roots and meanings and ways of life after the fall of your entire world. A film about choices and about options and about self forgiveness. And about the most profound fragility , defining yourself. A character of film seems be the lead pillar - Rodrigo . More precise, his words to Bobby who is not an encouragement but a sort of recipe to assume your present challenges. Short, a magnificent short film.

Personal and affecting film that gets the small things right and mostly avoids "moments"

[bob the moo · 14 February 2015]

Whether it be feature or short film, it is not always easy to deliver an emotional story in a way that rings true – at times the attempts to get them across can produce something far too ripe in melodrama and "actorly" moments, but then on the other hand if one tries to totally fold it all up then it comes across as overly restrained and feels like it is being deliberately indie or difficult. Not to say that it is difficult to do well, but it is something that can go wrong easily. I mention this because I think the strength of Grape Soda is that it does it mostly really well indeed.

The plot sees a man returning home to find what appears to be an emotional last straw, which impacts into the rest of his life. The film opens with this in a way that gives you an understanding of how the rest of the film will work – there is no flamboyant rage or awards-worthy outpouring of emotion; instead Bobby is just deflated – not accepting in the least, just looking defeated and hurt beyond histrionics. This continues through the film because there is not really one big thing that does it, but more the constant pain that comes out in small things, and occasionally manifests itself in small things becoming impossibly frustrating simply because the emotion is nothing to do with them. This is delivered so well that we really feel like we are with the character in how he is – it isn't a performance, it is a person going through this.

In Ashworth the film has the perfect lead performance. I'll admit that his accent threw me a bit at first but otherwise his performance was great – from his small bits of emotion in his words, through to his entire body language, all of it speaks of one unprocessable hurt after another, and it does so even before we understand the whole picture. The film understandably has more of a structured "moment" at the end, but even this is restrained, natural and convincing. The patience of the piece, and the stillness and realism of the delivery really makes it work, and it is surprisingly personal and affecting thanks to the careful and measured delivery across the board – although it is Ashworth that really sticks in the mind.