MICHAEL SOLACE is the latest film from Chris Esper.
The film is the story of a writer who is trying to sell a film script. As he tries to make a deal various characters come to life and challenge him not to make the deal because the producer will remove him from the project and do it his way.
As much as I love Chris' films, this film didn't quite work for me. To be certain its the best looking and best crafted film he's made to date. However the narrative doesn't quite come together the way it should. Part of it is the fact that the layers of reality/unreality get a bit too messy. And part of it is there is something wrong with the title character. I don't know if its because the normally excellent actor Justin Thibault is wrong for the role or if there is something wrong with the writing. Thibault has worked with Esper numerous times before and has always hit it out of the park, so I'm not quite sure what is off but it is. For me this is a double from a director who normally hits home runs.
This isn't to say that the film is bad, it isn't. It's actually quite good. Esper and writer Kris Salvi's exploration of an artist and his battle to retain artistic control is timely in the age where corporations with no soul and less imagination want to control everything, more so when they are run by brain dead execs who want their blank stamp on things so they can say they they did that.
Definitely worth searching out.
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