Anonymous 616
Written Review
Hi everyone and welcome to MyIndie Review Vlog,
the show that gives you spoiler-free reviews of indie films. My name is Asaf Angel from MyIndie Productions.
Today’s review is going to be on the 2018 horror-thriller, Anonymous 616. The film is brought to us by Canadian-born Swiss filmmaker, now living in the U.S., Mike Boss.
Thank you, Mike, for sharing your film with us.
The story follows two couples having a reunion night. Jason and Jenna, Erik and Monica, portrayed by Daniel DeWeldon, Jessica Boss, David Abramsky and Lena Roma.
Everything seems to go well at first. We get to learn a little bit about each character. We know Jason and Erik go way back and haven’t seen each other in a long time. Jason is a military combat-soldier with quite a few tours under his belt. Erik is a successful real-estate agent. Jenna is a kindergarten teacher and Monica is an Artist.
As the evening progresses, the four friends keep chatting, drinking and smoking weed. It looked like it was panning out to be a fun night.
Not feeling too well, Jason excuses himself and heads to the bathroom. After a short while, on his way back to rejoin his friends, he gets held up by an online chat with a mysterious stranger.
That’s when things start to go horribly wrong. Jason goes through an experience that challenges his own sense of self, and as for Jason’s friends… They are about to have a very bad night.
The film’s structure and performances are very well thought out. Because it was filmed in one location, the whole experience relies on the direction and the performances. Jason’s character stands out, because it is a very difficult character to perform well, especially when confined to a single location.
Watching a lot of films that have deranged characters in the lead, a common mistake that keeps surfacing is the ‘overdoing it’ habit. Even great actors are challenged by that.
Daniel DeWeldon needed to convince the viewer that he’s going from Normal to Psychotic, so he carefully quantified and slowly dished out the psychotic side of his character. The other performances were very good as well. The rest of the cast members needed to convincingly react to the extreme shift in tone. Keep in mind: Four people. One location and high energies. In all that, Mike Boss succeeded in conveying a story while keeping it within suspension of disbelief.
The setting layout thoroughly respects the logic of the world around the story. I’ll give a small example: Jason and Jenna visit Erik and Monica in their new house. Erik bought the house as it is thus far, the first and only one built in a new upcoming neighborhood. Erik even indulges on their temporary isolation from other residents by blasting loud music. So other than introducing Erik as a fun-loving guy, Boss tells us that they are secluded from other people, so that we accept that nobody comes to their aid when things go down. That kind of thought process was applied throughout the whole film. It’s noteworthy because it respects the audience’s intelligence.
Anonymous 616 is Boss’ first feature as director, he also wrote it. The film is stated to have had an extremely low budget of US$27,000. Boss even created a step-by-step video series, documenting his journey in bringing the film to life. To view series Click HERE (Scroll down to bottom of page).
To sum up, even though there were a few small moments, that felt a bit off-track, this is a great, well executed film with wonderful performances, that is most likely to stay with you, long after you’re done watching it.
Anonymous 616 gets a 7.5/10 on the Look At Me, I’m a Film Critic scale!
Go check it out for yourselves, the film is available on Amazon Prime. Let me know what you think.
Until next time, keep supporting Indie Film. My name is Asaf Angel, I thank you for tuning in to MyIndie Review Vlog.
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