Weekly Review -- Camera Enigma

Surveillance (2008) -- The anatomy of a crime is a strange thing to dissect, indeed. However, once you give the task to Jennifer Lynch, not only do you get impressive results, you are also left scratching your head in bewilderment whilst reconfiguring the past two hours in your mind. FBI agents Anderson (Julia Ormond) and Hallaway (Bill Pullman) have just arrived at a small-town police station to investigate reports of a murder and kidnapping. They start interviewing witnesses that include a little girl (Ryan Simpkins) and a drug addict (Pell James), but soon realize that there are numerous pieces missing from this puzzle... Lynch builds a world that is merciless in its inhumanity, with merely shades of white sneaking through the clearly divided black and grey. The screenplay makes some great points about evil that some people can be capable of; one scene presents a wonderful example of wordplay, while some others weigh different levels of brutality within the story's context. The cinematography -- chosen specifically by the filmmaker to suit each of the eyewitnesses' narrative -- is one of the film's most exceptional elements, ranging from ominously grainy to luminously colored, each of the sequences drawing on both its aesthetic and its momentum. Although it would be unfair to compare Lynch to her filmmaker father, I believe it is fair to note that his influence here is undeniable. From the quirky supporting characters like the absentminded soccer mom and the inquisitive receptionist, to the police officers that would rather wax philosophical than analyze a crime scene, this movie is a slice of the unlawfully bizarre. Ormond and Pullman are authoritative as the leads, deftly maneuvering through the screenplay's layers. James is excellent at portraying her character's evolution, while Simpkins is a revelation as the child survivor. While Surveillance starts off somewhat -- somewhat relating strictly to the Lynchian sense of the word -- as a mystery thriller, it grows into a narrative that defies convention at every turn. On the surface, it is an excitingly unpolished question mark, drawing us deeper and deeper into its puzzles; at its core, it is a study of good versus evil in a world that often disregards the former and glorifies the latter, sometimes through the very lense that our gaze penetrates.

8/10