Movielogr

Rating: 4 stars

All movies seen on 07/20/2007

View on: IMDb | TMDb

Cashback (2007)

Directed by Sean Ellis

Drama

Overview

After a painful breakup, Ben develops insomnia. To kill time, he starts working the late night shift at the local supermarket, where his artistic imagination runs wild.

Rated R | Length 102 minutes

Actors

Sean Biggerstaff | Emilia Fox | Shaun Evans | Michael Dixon | Michelle Ryan | Stuart Goodwin | Frank Hesketh | Daphne Guinness | Jay Bowen | Irene Bagach | Kenneth Fahy | Katie Ball | Erica Ellis | Marc Pickering | Jared Harris | Nick Hancock | Michael Lambourne | Stan Ellis | Nia Roberts | Winnie Li | Celesta Hodge | Lene Bausager | Hatti Riemer | Kinvara Balfour | Cherie Nichole | Keeley Hazell | Nadia Alkhashab | Samantha Bloom | Emilia Fenton | Lucy Holt | Janine-May Tinsley | Hayley-Marie Coppin | Christine Fuller | Michelle Bentley | Gary Beeson | Katarina Olsson | Gayle Dudley | Nelly Lyster-Smith | Henrietta Bess | Howard Ward | Roddy Adair | Lee Wilson | Wayne Ploughman | Gary Mcnulty | Natalie Denning | Matthew Hodgson | Tree Carr | Katrine Falkenberg | Graham Ward | Kubrick Ellis

Viewing History (seen 1 time)

Viewing Notes

This review originally appeared as a review for PopSyndicate in 2007.

Ordinary is extraordinary.

Ben Willis is a university art student that decides that he’ll never be able to do right by his girlfriend Suzy and he breaks up with her; then he realizes he made a mistake. At that point, he obsesses over her and their relationship and begins losing sleep to the point of becoming an insomniac. With eight more hours in the day and no money, Ben has no idea what to do with himself, so he lands a job at a local supermarket filled with quirky co-workers and an overabundance of extremely beautiful customers. When he discovers that he can stop time, Ben starts to find the beauty in the world, especially in the women around him who he disrobes so that he can sketch them.

As fantastic and borderline sci-fi as CASHBACK sounds, it is really quite a ‘normal’ movie: Ben is an average guy in fairly average situations dealing with an average crisis. It’s Ben’s mind that is extra-ordinary and we see it through Sean Ellis’ direction when time is frozen. Ellis films less like a director and more like a photographer, finding that exact moment in time that Ben is walking through. At that point, camera angles shift and the color palette brightens. Gradually the palette normalizes and becomes more and more vivid as Ben’s life improves. And, while the abundant nudity proves that directory Ellis is a fan of the female form, he doesn’t treat it like an AMERICAN PIE-like exploitative romp.

The cast is full of people you’ve probably never heard of, but name recognition really isn’t important here. As I said earlier it’s a ‘normal’ movie and bigger names might disrupt the low-key, subtle tones. Nonetheless, Sean Biggerstaff does well by the role of Ben and carries off the pensive look admirably. The surrounding cast that fill out Ben’s life hit the right beats and bring the right level of levity to the film, which otherwise could have overshadowed the message.

Magnolia continues it trend of releasing the movie on Friday and the DVD on Tuesday so this review works for both. The DVD extras are limited to a brief making-of, which is better than most and the original 20 minute short film. The short film is also most of the first 20 minutes of the movie as well but it’s nice to have it here to see the difference between the original concept and what it evolves into.

It’s never stated explicitly whether Ben’s power is real or imaginary, but the metaphor’s message is there: take the time to look around you once in a while. This is not a film that needs to be watched; this is a film that deserves to be seen.

Comments