No. 53 (2021) NINE DAYS JUNE 26th.

 

Film No. 53 (2021)  June 26th.  11:00 AM  Cinema 1   LUNA,  Leederville. 

"You are being considered for the amazing opportunity of life." (Will's opening address to all candidates who have applied for the opportunity of life on Earth).

It's always hard to recommend "high concept" films. These are films that take us into a new realm of thinking. They often teeter on the bounds of the ridiculous but with ordinary humans as the central characters. NINE DAYS is all of this, but has a deep meaning and asks a question of us all. What does this thing called life really mean?

Writer/director Edson Oda has etched a reputation as a thought provoking short film maker. A good grounding it would seem. NINE DAYS is a smart, thought provoking first feature about what a gift life would be, if one could fulfil the criteria to be accepted.

Will (Winston Duke) lives in a timber hut on a dystopian prairie. He has sidekick, Kyo (Benedict Wong). We meet them at the beginning of a cycle of new intakes. This intake are the next applicants wishing to be born into life on Earth. But as with all processes there can be complications, Will, being a man of compassion and commitment, wants to improve on his decisions and choices from the past and seeks to do so with this new intake. Can you believe we are let into the world of his past choices via recordings on VHS cassettes? Recordings of life through the eyes of his current choices living their lives on Earth in real time. 

That previous paragraph will either confuse you or spark your enthusiasm for exploring a new concept in film-making. We meet Erika Vasquez as Luiza and Bill Skarsgard playing Kane, bright new stars vying for selection. They cause Will to grapple with his understanding of his own shortcomings, particularly Luiza who gradually seeps into all our hearts. 

Every year there is a film that stays with me for days. Did it mean this or was it a metaphor for that? NINE DAYS is this film for me so far in 2021. My thought for the moment (8 days on) is; Was the hut a metaphor for the egg, and the applicants the sperm vying to be chosen as the one who fertilizes the egg? Could be I suppose, until I think of a new meaning for NINE DAYS.  10GUMS.