An award-winning indie film from England that is currently being distributed online via Bigstar.tv, DUMMY (2008) is the directorial debut of Matthew Thompson. It’s an intelligent and poetic drama about dealing with grief and loss.
Two brothers struggle to deal with the sudden death of their mother who overdosed on her pain medication. The eldest brother, Danny (Aaron Johnson from KICK-ASS, NOWHERE BOY) seethes with resentment over his mother’s death and resulting need to look after kid brother, Jack (Thomas Grant). Their mother had made Danny promise to look after his brother. But Jack is firmly in denial, imagining that their mother is alive, dressing up a mannequin/dummy to be like her. This, one can imagine, is how Anthony Perkin’s mom-loving character got started in PSYCHO.
Part of the film is told in flashbacks depicting a loving single-mom family to when the brothers discover their mother’s body. We’re not told what illness the mother was suffering, but when one brother is shocked to lift a wig off her head, it’s the beginning of a quiet horror of maternal secrets that are uncovered after her death. The flashbacks are revealing and tragic.
But once Danny brings home a girlfriend for overnight stays, the brothers’ household begins to unravel. Danny becomes more involved with sex, booze and drugs, hoping to become a DJ. And as you might expect with a household run by an 18 year old, the home soon becomes a pig sty, occasionally cleaned up when Jack is in “mom” mode.
The performances are moving – Johnson and Grant are immediate and believable as brothers dealing with the untimely loss of their mother. And the ending is cathartic and haunting. There’s no wonder that Aaron Johnson is an actor on the rise. DUMMY is reminiscent of LARS AND THE REAL GIRL, Ryan Gosling‘s indie film that also dealt with loss though LARS definitely played up the mannequin for laughs. And if you’re surfing the web for reviews, DUMMY unfortunately shares the same title as an Adrien Brody comedy.
Definitely worth checking out – and Bigstar.tv offers a free 30 day trial period!
One thing about Bigstar.tv. Indie films struggle to find an audience and therefore distribution. There is a finite number of movie theater screens, so the Internet is a game changer once the stigma of a ‘straight-to-video’ release is overcome. But on demand and online venues like Bigstar still need to overcome glitches in buffering and bandwidth. Bigstar’s search function isn’t very sophisticated, so it’s more for browsing – some sort of ‘recommended’ titles based on preferences would be extremely helpful