In a normal suburban house, in a normal suburban
neighbourhood, with normal suburban neighbours and a normal suburban family,
Alexandra plans an abnormal birthday surprise for her husband Steve. He goes to
work with suspicions of a surprise party, but learns that he only got the
‘surprise’ part right when he gets home and finds the house deserted, lights
not working, phone disconnected, and the locks changed locking him in. In the
living room is a present for him; a videotape that Alexandra has made for him
telling him how unhappy she is, how horrible their marriage is…and how he’ll
never see his children again.
I sat and watched this movie, horrified, in a
theatre at uni because that’s what made up our lecture yesterday. Demented and
disturbing, Alexandra’s Project is a
gritty and raw psyche-thriller/revenge-drama that sits in the same sphere of
difference and eccentricity as Sex, Lies, and Videotape, and Wake in Fright.
In a normal suburban house, in a normal suburban neighbourhood, with normal
suburban neighbours and a normal suburban family, Alexandra plans an abnormal
birthday surprise for her husband Steve. He goes to work with suspicions of a
surprise party, but learns that he only got the ‘surprise’ part right when he
gets home and finds the house deserted, lights not working, phone disconnected,
and the locks changed locking him in. In the living room is a present for him;
a videotape that Alexandra has made for him telling him how unhappy she is, how
horrible their marriage is…and how he’ll never see his children again.
Director
Rolf de Heer has used very clever and cheeky cues to lead/mislead the audience
of Alexandra’s Project down a road
that seems familiar, but then takes a swan dive down into a rabbit hole of
horror. For a start, as soon as we see the suburban setting of the film, we’re
reminded of American Beauty and
instantly we assume that there will be some startling drama happening behind
the scenes of this seemingly ‘normal’ suburban family. Our assumptions are
confirmed when de Heer uses recognisable, Hitchcockian, camera movements to
hint that there is something sinister and unsettling about the character of
Alexandra. Not to mention that the unfulfilled housewife and dissatisfied
marriage is something that we’ve seen time and time again from The Stepford Wives to The Hours.
When the thriller aspect of
the story comes into play, this intertextuality proves to have lead us in
entirely the wrong direction and we are now faced with this startling and
confronting videotape of this hugely unsatisfied, arguably unhinged, woman. I
don’t want to give too much away, but seriously, if you’re into these
completely off-centre, smaller budget films, rent yourself out a copy of this.
I wish to draw quick attention to the performance given by Helen Buday who
stars as Alexandra. She was fantastic, delivering a performance that was timid,
gloomy, and bleak, but then on videotape becoming animated and really rather
scary. She was great. Round of applause please.
Starring Gary Sweet, Bogdan
Koca, Samantha Knigge, and Jack Christie, Alexandra’s
Project is a startling shattering of the ideal suburban married life filled
with sex, impromptu piercing, and drama. I don’t think I’ll add it to the
collection, but if you’re into these out-of-field, quirky, movies, I’d recommend
it.
No comments:
Post a Comment