Angeline

An artist is guided by an old friend to face the feelings he is keeping inside about the loss of his partner, in an effort to get them out on the canvas.

Xander (Hicks) has lost his mojo. He lost his partner, Angeline (Colton-Davenport) some time ago, and now we find him moping about in his flat staring at a blank canvas with no inspiration or motivation to paint. Luckily, Xander’s best friend from when he was five years old has turned up; a clown (Hunt) with a happy face and frizzy, red hair; and now Xander has found something within himself that he thinks he could express through acrylic.

Unfortunately for Xander, the urge to paint his lost love Angeline has opened up some unclosed wounds from inside, and her memory takes that opportunity to face him from the dead and encourage him to join her. While Xander hugs and dances with his love we can feel him getting dragged further and further into her embrace, watching as he slowly unravels in front of her until he can’t take it anymore.

Throughout the whole of Angeline, Xander doesn’t say anything at all, lost as he is inside his own head. Director and co-writer, William Stogden keeps everything very much in the arthouse style as we watch Xander’s descent into madness, using image and sound design to tell the story rather than the spoken word. Music also plays a big part in Angeline, with a memorable tune from Empire underpinning the meat of the narrative, harking back to simpler times with an almost golden oldie feel to the track.

While it’s easy to tell that Angeline has been made on the tiniest of shoestring budgets, Stogden’s decisions as director keep everything in the narrative present and forceful within the frame. There’s a real economy to the film, not just from the set or the props, but in how much is squeezed from each part of the story to help the audience identify with Xander’s plight. The way the lighting shifts, the camera moves, or the characters change, is almost Lynchian in the effect it achieves, and along with the spot-on sound design, every emotion is expressed genuinely as the themes and narrative get explored.

At just six-and-a-half minutes long, Angeline extends this economy into its runtime as well. Co-writer and cinematographer, Sasha Morris, helps keep the story right where it needs to be while also helping the scenes and transitions look good on screen. Nothing is wasted in Angeline, and thankfully, there’s no filler either. Everything we see has its place, and is always either expressing something or moving the narrative forward. For what is a short film, on a small budget, from a small production house, Angeline showcases what can be achieved when you focus on your filmmaking and try to get the best out of what you have.