Sunny Side Up Film Review

I love this movie. It starts off feeling like a student project but immediately I am triggered by it because it is getting it right and that is all I could hope to say for a film. Can I end the review now?

No. No one’s looking at me – no one is reading this review. No one cares. I am writing too much. My grammar is shit. Ok, I’ll stop beating myself up. Sound like all of the social media is judging me – why do I even bother. Say something to them. Don’t say everything out loud. I think I am talking out loud. Am I talking out loud?

I probably drink too much. I think I am an emotional eater. Why did I bake chocolate cookies at 4 am when I just want a piece of chocolate cake? At 4 am. “Someone’s going to notice.”

This movie has a nice soundtrack. The ambient guitars. A sense of tension and sublimation. Ok – “let’s just take a moment, deep breath, here we go. Same as every day.” This movie is so on point it feels trite. Oh, maybe that is just me. Should I admit that?

Why is the lighting so garish? I can tell someone tried.

Oh, the hero is an embalmer. I will never be that. They go full magical realism. OK, here it comes. When I was a kid it would take me hours to get ready for family events – because I thought I was too fat, my clothes didn’t fit right, I would seem fake, I was too tired, I wasn’t good enough, I was always late, I was too hot, I hadn’t had time to eat breakfast, why was I so tired?

There’s a scene that feels like a high school filmmaking thesis on Chinatown. I don’t know why the solid attempt at lighting feels nothing more than adequate or the acting feels like an industrial. They are doing fine. Why am I so judgy? I love what I am seeing.

I would always hold my breath when driving by a cemetery because I was told that you lose that many seconds of life when you breathe.

I love this scene about buying cans of sardines at the gourmet grocery store. That survival instinct. The self-consciousness that you are buying too many. I remember having those terrifying moments in the grocery store. Playing it cool while I couldn’t afford everything at Whole Foods. That idea of being “almost there” while standing in the checkout line.

I remember telling Deb at Ralph’s grocery that I was leaving for Canada. She had become a good friend in recent weeks, as I was at the grocery store almost daily. (I am an emotional eater). She said – oh man take me with you.

Now the protagonist is drinking something late at night. He flops onto the bed exhausted with himself. I am writing this at 10:45 am. I haven’t been to bed yet.

Why does this movie get me?

That’s five hundred words.

Am I going to run this through Grammarly? Run it through Grammarly. Am I going to hit publish? Fuck.

Don’t say these things out loud. Watch this movie. Understand the thing. Those weirdos. They are OK, there are just super dialled-up on the ontology. Be kind.

Sometimes the protagonist literally exposits what is happening. The filmmaker voice-over what he is thinking. It’s so glib and trite. It’s fine. It’s on point. So painfully on-point that it’s amazing. I am thinking about that time me and Kat went for dinner at Hugo’s. I used to drive then. She gave me two books. Not one, two. Who was I then? What happened to me since? Why is there a pandemic? I can’t do anything about it. There is some terrible ADR in this movie. I don’t mind.

Wow, I really liked this hand-made film. Thank you film for validating my experience.

Hit Publish. Are you fucking nuts?

No one cares.

Publish.

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Gregory Samuel’s debilitating social anxiety and self-deprecating inner voice prevent him from leading the “normal life” he so desires. The young funeral director’s fears are confronted when he is given a 30-day leave of absence and forced to address his social phobia. His solution — he won’t leave his apartment for the entire month. His respite is put to the test by Emma, a curious, spirited neighbor looking for a friend.

From writer/director Mike Melo, and starring Hunter Davis, Samantha Creed, and Alan Pelz-Sharpe, SUNNY SIDE UP it premiered On Demand December 4, 2020.