Indie Gems: Entanglement

-
Finding where you went wrong.

Ben's (Thomas Middleditch) life is a complete mess. His wife just left him, and the opening scene is him failing at several suicide attempts. He's determined to figure out where he went wrong in life so he can attempt to fix it. He finds out from his parents that he almost had a sister. They adopted a daughter, but when his mother found out she was pregnant they had to give her back to the agency. With the help of his neighbor Tabby (Diana Bang) he eventually finds Hanna (Jess Weixler) and they fall in love. Don't worry, there's more.

This is going to be a strange review because I both loved this film and had a serious problem with its execution. I can't stop thinking about it. I actually watched it twice. (It helps that it's available to stream on Netflix and is a whopping 85 minutes long) First thing, when Hanna gets introduced, you're going to immediately think you walked into some manic pixie dream girl bullshit, but just stay with it. It will all make sense. Without getting into spoiler territory this film is obviously a study on mental illness and it takes a very whimsical approach to it. I think this works at the beginning, but not so much at the end. I felt there was a lot more this film could've addressed and it would have benefited by an extra 10 minutes.

The actors are wonderful. I enjoy Middleditch's work in Silicon Valley and he gets to show a bit more range here that I really enjoyed. Jess Weixler is always a welcome presence in film. Diana Bang was new to me and I really liked Tabby as well. 

At the end of the day, this is a heavy topic disguised as a romantic comedy. It asks you to question all of the tropes that go along with that as well. It's a delightful film that may annoy you after you finish that they didn't take a bit more care in it, but at the same time, were they ever aiming to do that in the first place? 

Grade: B

Watched on: Netflix

Memorable Quote: "I wanted to be awake again." - Ben (Thomas Middleditch)

Comments

Post a Comment

Thanks for stopping by, let's talk movies!
(comments are moderated to reduce spam)

Popular posts from this blog

Random Ramblings: The Radio Flyer Conundrum

-
Image
Recently, I was talking to someone about who I thought were the best child actors when I was also a child.  Two that really stood out to me were Elijah Wood and Joseph Mazello, and one film those two were in together was called Radio Flyer.  Then I was reminded about the uniqueness of this film. Instead of reviewing the film, I wanted to have an open discussion about the ending. It deals with a tough issue; child abuse. What I’ve noticed is the way that the film ends is interpreted many different ways, and the filmmakers never came forward to say what was right and wrong. I’m interested in hearing everyone’s opinions on it. How did you interpret the ending? Obviously spoiler alerts will follow.. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, the basic premise is this: Two young boys, Mikey (Wood) and Bobby (Mazello) move in with their single mother and her boyfriend, who refers to himself as ‘The King’. It doesn’t take long for The King to start physically abusing ...
Read more

Indie Gems: Behind The Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

-
Image
Passionate about your profession? I had never heard of this film until it ended up on one of Jason's favorite horror movie lists around Halloween. It immediately sounded interesting to me, so of course I threw it in my Netflix queue. (and if I'm just now watching it after adding it around Halloween, you know how ridiculous my queue is) Taylor (Angela Goethals) is a journalist who, along with a film crew decides to follow around a serial killer named Leslie Vernon. (Nathan Baesel) He plans on doing the typical slasher thing - getting a bunch of drunk teens in an abandoned house and knocking them off one by one. He gets advice from a retired serial killer, Eugene (Scott Wilson) and is threatened by a man who's on to him, Doc Holloran (Robert Englund) Taylor and crew are there capturing it all. Leslie Vernon is fucking hilarious to start with, and clearly very passionate about what he does. He tells Taylor all of his secrets and can barely contain his excitemen...
Read more

My Favorite Movie Youtube Channels

-
Image
Starting around 2018, I started watching Youtube for more than just movie trailers or music videos whenever a new one dropped. Now I'm in full blown subscription mode and don't bat an eyelash at watching a Youtube video that's over an hour long. I watch Youtube for a few different categories of content, but one of them that I love most is movie/TV essays and commentary, and that's what I'm going to talk about today. Below is a list of my favorite movie related Youtube channels. Let me know if you're familiar with them too, or if you have any you'd like to recommend to me.  Double Toasted - I'm honestly surprised this channel isn't bigger. I first came across Korey and Martin when they reviewed War for the Planet of the Apes a few months before it hit theaters and I thought they were hysterical. While their full length videos stream on Twitch, they often upload their movie reviews and commentary on youtube and they're always hilarious. They've...
Read more