Thursday, August 02, 2007

"Cashback" (2007) by Sean Ellis

Based on the Oscar nominated short, Cashback is the tale of life on the graveyard shift at a supermarket. When a bad break-up leads to insomnia, art student Ben joins the nocturnal existence of a group of young grocers who indulge in the art of the imagination. As Ben learns to let his run free, he begins to see beauty in the ordinary as well as the possibility to love again.

Here's the trailer:

Here's the original 18 minute short:

I really liked this movie. At some points it suffered from debut feature film syndrome (too many ideas crammed into one movie) but it's still highly recommended. The IMDM rating is 7.5/10

Justin Chang wrote this for Variety:

Slickly charming, genteelly erotic and directed with supreme polish, "Cashback" is a conventional romantic comedy that plays unconventional games with time and memory. Elaborating on his Oscar-nominated short of the same title, Brit filmmaker Sean Ellis reveals a gift for formal sleight-of-hand that's ultimately more dazzling than his patly amusing script. Though frank sexuality will limit audience scope, pic's kudo cachet and bankable title should earn worldwide distrib Gaumont some cashback of its own from savvy younger viewers. [..] It's [in the supermarket] that Ben discovers his ability to stop time, a phenomenon that gives him a new appreciation for the beauty around him. The beauties in this supermarket readily identify pic as a supremely cushy male fantasy. Ben wanders the aisles of the store undressing the drop-dead gorgeous women around him -- photographed by Angus Hudson in unsparing detail -- then sketches their portraits.

Buy the DVD at Amazon:

3 comments:

Unknown said...

saw it yesterday night... its good small movie... ty for the recomendation!

YNF said...

Great short film.
Thankx.

Anonymous said...

I agree. A great film.
Thx