By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.8 cats
Director: Peter Collins Campbell
Starring: Aubin Wise | Martha Brown | Morgan Campbell | Nate Wise | Odinaka Malachi Ezeokoli
Country: united_states
Year: 2021
Running time: 74
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13983486/reference
Brett says: “‘This place isn’t like anything. It’s like the absence of things.’
“The debut feature film DIMLAND is Peter Collins Campbell’s exploration into lost youth and disappointment with idle maturity. Highly understated, the film guides audiences to its central themes rather than drags them. Such is the case with main character Brynn who finds herself during the minimalist exposition looking for a retreat from the regularity and mundaneness of adulthood when she grabs hold of a random notion to flee urban civilization and flee to a childhood getaway she remembers visiting when she was too young to ever imagine what the world had in store for her.
“Accompanying her on this getaway is her boyfriend Laika, who serves partly as Brynn’s series of narrative checkpoints and partly as the symbolic antagonist to her adulthood as she navigates the mysterious and magical exploration of her inner self while on this woodland encounter.
“It does not take long for the film to introduce an eerie, soft-spoken third character whose presence serves as the core of what the film represents and reminds us of. We are immediately frightened, alarmed, leery, creeped out by this character, and the film does its due diligence in carefully exploring why. And the cosmic answer within speaks volumes to our evolved sensibilities as we flee who we once were in the name of growing older and—perhaps paradoxically—’wiser.’
“The woods are a standard locale for fear and uncertainty and play a major role in the atmosphere of the film. Beyond the woods, what else resides? In exploring that, the metaphorical depth of this film registers at levels akin to the existential masterpiece A GHOST STORY. The plot that unfolds and that we try to piece together is as much about ourselves as it is any of the characters. Brynn’s discovery is a lament of our own experiences and discoveries. As it turns out, adult repression is much more frightening than the majesty of the limitless woods.
“An outstanding and jaw-dropping cinematography and visual effects team elevate this quiet, subdued narrative to majestic levels during the film’s narrative peaks. Altogether, this mood piece is a confluence of discomfort and peace, longing and naïveté, darkness and gorgeousness.
“4 cats with the caveat that revisiting this film a second time in the near future might accentuate the positives even more and elevate it past the small exceptions that prevented the highest possible rating
“Recommended for fans of existentialist themes
“Recommended for fans of cold chills in the face of the unknown”
Chris says: “This sort of plays like a slow-burn fever dream to the point where I felt it occasionally flew over my head a bit. But it encompasses an altered state of consciousness, perhaps an entire world that’s still on my mind a few days later. 3.5 cats“
Michael says: “For his feature directorial debut, music video director Peter Campbell chose a quiet, fantastical tale that could be looked at as the perils of nostalgia, the difficult transition from childhood to adulthood, or the way we deal with mental illness, depending on how deep you want to look. Brynn is a young woman out of sorts. Slightly depressed, she seeks a change of scenery, so she and her boyfriend, Laika, head out to the woods to stay in a family cottage and recharge. When they arrive, Brynn is dismayed to find the cottage recently-renovated into a fancy vacation home for the AirBnB crowd. Yet as they settle in, she finds that not everything has changed, and a dear friend from her childhood comes a calling. Brynn doesn’t recognize the oddly named Rue at first, as he is bundled in winter clothes and his face is concealed with an odd, wooden mask. Laika things Rue is awfully strange, but Brynn starts to remember him from her childhood and begins to spend more and more time with him, until it becomes clear that Rue is not simply a childhood friend, and Brynn is in danger of losing herself to another world.
“DIMLAND is a fairly straight-forward, yet spiritual look at a fragile woman’s psyche, and the challenges she and many of us face in dealing with the transitioning responsibilities of adulthood. While Brynn may be suffering some deeper mental illness, DIMLAND was reminiscent to one of my favorite recent films, ANNE AT 13,000 FT. in the way it doesn’t seek to paint their lead characters as victims, nor as sources of unwarranted sympathies, but shoes the challenges their mental states pose to those around them. The acting in DIMLAND is quite strong, particularly Martha Brown as Brynn, and Nate Wise, who adopts a somewhat otherworldly voice, and odd shamble as Rue.The settings beautiful, with misty woods and rolling hills, but the strongest part of this thoughtful debut is certainly Campbell’s script. 4 cats“