Our Little Haven

I'm sittin here with the knowledge that this film was made for pennies - £4,000, and all I keep thinking is how?

Sure, there's the odd bit that look cheap - and most of the film is in exteriors or small underdressed locations, and sometimes the sound is a bit iffy... but this is some whacko crazy art house film with some stunning photography and solid performances, and it's bold - it's a lengthy thing, with moving emotional parts, and some coginitive thinking.

It's so well executed and atmospheric - like the ghostly woman walking around in the park thinking of her life... it's all so well done that I'm sort of stunned.

It surely couldn't have cost so little?

And if it really did, well that's bloody amazing!

I'm sittin here with the knowledge that this film was made for pennies - £4,000, and all I keep thinking is how was none of that money spent on story and bringing in another writer to flesh some of the scenes out.

It all looks cheap as most of the film is in exteriors or small underdressed locations, and the sound is iffy... but this isnt some whacko crazy art house film with some poor photography and awful performances, and it's boring - and OMG it's a lengthy thing, with no moving or emotional parts, and way too much cognitive thinking, hoping the viewer will fill in the blanks.

It's badly executed and boring, did I mention boring a lot like the ghostly woman walking around in the park thinking of her life... it's all so awful that I'm sort of stunned they released it outside the director/writers friends and family.

They surely couldn't have spent so little on the writing?

And if they did, it might have been passable!

There's no denying that film history has been haunted by the notion that time, space and memory are all interlinked by the medium of film ever since Gilles Deleuze completed his two book studies on the subject matter. And with 'Our Little Haven', a deliciously shot indie cinemascope film, delves into that particular realm of the cinematic language by continuously offsetting a series of echoing scenes which ripple in the film's storyline.

There are many moments to love here - from the story of a couple who are searching for their lost dog, which ends with a panic attack / heart attack, to the whispering of a woman communicating to a man she has met... but isn't present in her timeline, or life time.

Overall the film could be argued as excessively self indulgent in terms of its 'purest' form of cinema, but those that grow tiresome of it, or even irritated with its lack of direct plot points, are failing to grasp the uniqueness of the experience at hand and the film's bold technical skill.

Vu ce film en avant première, et je dis - c'est magnifiquement tiré.