Five twentysomethings have spent the past five-plus months cooped up in an isolated house in the middle of nowhere. Every aspect of their lives is observed by hidden cameras and broadcast 24/7 on the web. Now, with the one million dollar prize in sight, it starts to seem that their mysterious backers are determined the five should not claim it…
I had mixed feelings about Marc Evans’s reality TV/horror hybrid when I saw the film at the 2002 Edinburgh International Film Festival. One the one hand, I was impressed by the technical qualities of the film, with the director using digital surveillance style cameras to successfully convey the feel of a reality TV show or webcast, and with the believable, naturalistic performances from the essentially unknown cast. On the other, I found the central premise, with it eventually being revealed that the gameshow is a snuff movie type set up, hard to believe – wouldn’t the target audience for the site just go to www.snuff-u-want.com rather than waiting five months for something to finally happen?
This two DVD set of My Little Eye , while doing nothing to overturn my initial impressions, is impressive for the added value it provides for fans, with a full length commentary track and interactive presentation on disc one and an hour's worth of documentary and deleted scenes on disc two.
The film itself is presented in its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The transfer is a solid one though, by the nature of the film, is intentionally on the grungy side despite being free from grain, damage and artefacting.
The 5:1 Dolby Digital audio impresses, showcasing the imaginative sound design on the film and adding to the unease.
The commentary track, with director Evans and producer Jon Fitt, isn't earth-shattering but does add to one's appreciation and understanding of the film. Intelligent but not over-intellectualising, the men are able to talk about surveillance and voyeurism without invoking the panopticon or digressing into the gendered nature of the cinematic apparatus.
Evans highlights the challenges posed by the film in terms of combining two somewhat contradictory aesthetics – the spectacle of horror and the banality of reality TV – and admits that, sometimes – a slow motion sequence here; a decapitation there – maybe it didn’t quite work.
But, then again, given the obvious difficulties of a shoot when you don’t have the usual degree of freedom/control over where your cameras go such lapses from what could otherwise just about be a Dogme 95 horror film (ignoring that Dogma films aren’t supposed to be of a genre, even if they have subsequently arguably become one…) can easily be excused.
The interactive feature, which the viewer must use a special login code to access, uses the webcast metaphor to good effect, presenting the viewer with a choice of viewing angles of key scenes and "raw footage", accompanied by commentary from the website organisers though, as with a poorly designed website, maybe isn't as easy and intuitive to use as it might be.
Much of the same material from the interactive version appears again in the form of the deleted scenes, which are also presented with an optional commentary track with the producer and director. With the exception of an alternate ending, these scenes are of a character development and expository type and one gets the impression that their inclusion would have made the film a very different animal.
The half hour documentary splits into two rough parts, the first dating from the time of the film's production and the second picking up the story once it has been released. The first half, with cast and crew voicing their hopes and fears for the shoot is pretty run of the mill, though Evans's honesty – he needs a commercial hit after two critical successes that didn't exactly set the box office alight – is refreshing. The second half is more interesting. We learn how the film was tested in the wake of 9/11 and went down badly. A straight to video release, and the likely end of Evans's directorial career loomed. Then, thanks to some successful film festival screenings (Edinburgh and Toronto) and good word of mouth, a buzz started to generate. Thus, though the film has, to date, not yet been released stateside, it's more than recouped its (modest) production costs in the UK alone, giving Evans the hit he needed to embark on his fourth feature…
The package is rounded off by the usual trailer and stills galleries.
All in all, those who liked My Little Eye will find this DVD a worthwhile purchase.
Copyright © K H Brown 2002-2005
Rating:
5.0 / 5
(1 vote)
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