Abrupt Decision (2011/Water Bearer DVD)/@
Suicide Room (2011/Wolfe DVD)/Decision
(2011/Image DVD)
Picture: C Sound: C/C+/C Extras: C-/C-/D Main Programs: C+/C+/C-
There is
a sad new trend that has been building since the 1980s and it mirrors the
immorality society here and abroad have taken on. You get bashed for doing something good and
bullying is suddenly accepted as a way of life.
There are ideological underpinnings to this and this all struck me
coincidentally in three new releases coming out at about the same time.
Paul
Bright’s Abrupt Decision (2011) is a
gay drama about a man in a quandary because he is having both relationship and
employment issues, plus family with needs.
Bright said he felt his generation was becoming lost and it may not be
the only one since the 1980s. This has
to do in part with values and though I felt I saw much of what is here before,
what he is trying to say and do here goes beyond gay issues. It is about an abrasive culture and what
action individuals need to take on to make a change and even survive. Extras include cast interviews and a
mini-documentary.
Bullying
even enters this in odd ways, but that becomes a more direct issue in the next
two releases.
Jan
Komasa’s @ Suicide Room (2011) is
from Poland, not the U.S., yet it
would fit in any country easily as a young man (Jakub Gierszal) goes to a good
school and from a family of some means, but he has sexuality issues and may be
gay. He is also more interested in
morbid death issue and is more angry as a result of his isolation and that
makes him an easier target when he kisses a guy as a joke. This backfires and he becomes that target,
but there are other issues and personal entanglements and he is not only involved
with a dumb death worship site that shows bodily mutilation, but the makers add
a strange twist where he also gets involved with a virtual reality videogame
world.
This was
just fine without the game, but the makers seem sincere in reaching out to
youths involved in the coldness of social networking and the cyberworld, though
that held this back and complicated a promising release. The acting and locations work, as do many
moments of the script, yet this might work for some, but we only get a trailer
as an extra which does not help. I just
wish it had offered more or gone into non-cyber directions with even more
points.
But it is
at least ambitious and honest enough versus the flat fluff of Thomas
Mankowski’s Decision (2011), which
is also about bullying and despite being a big issue in the film, the case the
DVD comes in suspiciously removes that issue from the synopsis. Why, because this has a bizarre political
agenda. The boy being bullied here has
lost his father, but the lesson here is it is really all his fault and if he
just follows certain parts of the Bible (in a brief, oversimple text section
they at least note on the package this time), everything will work out? This also implies if he is angry,
individualistic or even gay (not an issue here, but still) maybe he deserves to
be beaten up. How sick and offensive can
you get? Then the whole issue is
sidestepped, reminding us it is this kind of dangerous oversimplification that
is justifying bullying and predatory behavior in the first place, which anyone
would hardly consider Christian and is embarrassing! Thanks for nothing Dove Organization!
The anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on all three releases is softer than I would have
liked, with Suicide limited by its
dated CG animation. The lossy Dolby
Digital 5.1 on Suicide is better than that of Decision, which is sloppy and spread around. Its Dolby 2.0 Stereo is no better. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo on Abrupt has
location audio limits, but is no thinner than Decision.
- Nicholas Sheffo