"Cashback" (2006)

‎"Cashback" (2006) Review: 

Insomnia's Brighter Side

Unless told that "Cashback", newcomer Sean Ellis' brilliant feature film was originally an Oscar nominated short film extended to it's full playing time one would be suspicious. Rarely have projects such as these worked so brilliantly if not so smoothly. In addition to this, the film manages to dabble in the finer points of ending a relationship while still maintaining some levity and avoiding an overly
professorial tone. In short, this is a wonderful little art house piece combining the angst of first love lost and the world of the imagination. 
The film, beginning briefly after our quirky protagonist Ben Willis (Sean Biggerstaff) breaks up with his first true girlfriend Suzy (Michelle Ryan) which he notes in long somewhat well written monologues as being completely heartbreaking. Finding himself unable to sleep and bored with the additional eight hours of life he experiences each and every day, he takes up a night shift at a chain grocery store. From there the film truly takes off as Ben finds his feet again and slowly returns back to the world of the living. When watching this film it is imperially better to experience the random and beautiful story unfold for the first time rather than spoil any small details of it up front.
The film is built around very interesting visuals created with traditional filming techniques cleverly crafted to beg the question, "how did he do that?" The story sometimes seems too concerned with creating interesting visuals such as a shot which reportedly took a day off of the film's month long filming schedule in which Ben moves backwards from a pay phone to a bed. There is nothing wrong with this yet it sometimes seems a bit too produced for such a low budget film and in no way aid the story.
What the film succeeds in is character development. By presenting interesting and anti-cliche characters, Ellis invites the audience into the film to ruminate on the loss of love with strange yet very likable people. 
It is tempting to compare this film with, as Kyle Smith did in his "New York Post" review, Kevin Smith who's comedy "Clerks" (1994) captured similar elements of life in one's early twenties. However, comparing these two films is ridiculous as this film stands aside as a different beast entirely not relying solely on comedy to push it along but also the true human drama behind this experience.
With standard fare acting and some delightful if not sometimes overly ponderous dialogue the film's content is largely interchangeable with many independent oddball comedies except for sequences in which Ben imagines the world frozen in time and mentally undresses all of the women in the grocery store which is interesting and a reason many will eagerly watch the film after reading this review. Some have blasted this film for being pornographic in content yet, when aiding one's audience in swallowing the messages and meanings the film tries to imbue upon it's viewer it's helpful to have a teat or two to look at while doing so.
Is this film "Citizen Kane"?, by no means. Yet this film is thoroughly enjoyable and surprisingly deep as it straddles both comedy and drama and hyperrealism and ultimately, how much more can we ask as an audience than to be cradled in the bosom of of fine film and reminded that everything works it's way out.

Stars: 8.5/10