ucla school of theater, film & television Alan
Estridge’s “At Wit’s Vend” features a candy
bar as its protagonist. “At Wit’s Vend”
Directed by Alan Estridge Screening on Saturday, June 12 and
Wednesday, June 16 “At Wit’s Vend” is a setup in
search of a punch line. It relays the cute story of the last candy
bar in a vending machine struggling to survive as a night janitor
tries to buy him. The four-minute, digitally-animated film
showcases the talent of Alan Estridge, its writer/director, as an
animator, but not as a storyteller. The machine tips over, the
candy bar escapes, and all is right and well, unless you’re
the janitor.
But nobody wants to be him. Grizzly, simplistic and
flat, the two-dimensional janitor acts as a convenient counter to
the three-dimensional candy bar, if not a worthy
adversary.
A literal cartoon, the janitor feels less human than the candy
bar, which has depth and a shadow. It’s a worthy metaphor,
but a complex one to attempt to relate when it takes less time to
watch the film than to eat its protagonist.
ucla school of theater, film & television (Top left) Feltch
Sanders (Philip Ferentinos) and Blossom Mather (Clay Adkins) star
in the disco-era detective flick “Feltch Sanders.”
“Feltch Sanders” Directed by Abe Sylvia
Screening on Wednesday, June 16 If Quentin Tarantino
wasn’t so obsessed with women, he might have made
“Feltch Sanders” as a student film.
The movie, in which a pair of exuberantly homosexual 1970s
private detectives search for a rich man’s lost boy toy,
exudes a certain self-confident flair that outweighs any
shortcomings in the story’s structure.
In the opening scene, Blossom Mather (Clay Adkins), one of the
two detectives, answers the phone by rattling off a series of
confidently conclusive, almost couplet-like rhymes explaining what
exactly it is he and Feltch Sanders (Philip Ferentinos), his public
and private-life partner, do ““ at least in their public
lives.
Their private lives are another story. Alluding to, but not
fully exploring the kinds of problems Mather and Sanders face as
boyfriends (although they’re probably too cool to label
themselves as such), “Feltch Sanders” errs only on
focusing too much on the mediocre detective storyline and not
enough on Mather and Sanders’ wholly entertaining
relationship, however it is they define it.
It’s style over substance all the way in this film, which
works out just fine, especially when you’re able to provide a
whole new meaning to the term “private dick.”
ucla school of theater, film & television Lisa (Alexandra
Ford Thum) comforts Thor (Donovan Oakleaf) in “Chaos
Theory.” “Chaos Theory” Directed by Suny
Behar Screening on Tuesday, June 15 Some romantic
comedies, most recently “Meet the Parents,” revolve
around the pure misfortune of their male leads as the men attempt
to overcome obstacle after obstacle in a series of never-ending
mishaps to win the girl of their dreams. Such films rely on an
audience’s sympathy with the-man-who-can’t-do-right and
trust that all will turn out well in the end because, after all, it
is a movie.
“Chaos Theory,” a half-hour fable that compares the
famed scientific deduction to its male lead’s love life,
falls neatly into that category of moviemaking. The male
protagonist is named Thor (Donovan Oakleaf), since there is no
better name for the typical male who just can’t seem to catch
a break. The movie features Thor stumbling through his relationship
with Lisa (Alexandra Ford Thum) in adequate fashion, but
“Chaos Theory” sinks into the inevitable paradox the
genre brings with it.
To separate itself from other similar films, the scenarios Thor
finds himself in must become more and more creatively bizarre; but
as they do, they also become less and less realistic, pushing an
audience away from the hero instead of bringing it closer to
him.
And that’s where the lunacy of much of “Chaos
Theory” falls flat, making too much out of the one small
incident that triggers the film’s story. A butterfly flapping
its wings in Brazil may cause a tornado in Texas, but that still
doesn’t make it any easier for two people to fall in
love.