Genre Grandeur – Infinite Man (2014) – Epileptic Moon Dancer

For this month’s next review for Genre Grandeur – Alternate Love Story Movies, here’s a review of Infinite Man (2014) by Jordan of Epileptic Moon Dancer

Thanks again to Abbi of Abbiosbiston.com for choosing this month’s genre.

Next month’s Genre has been chosen by Tim of FilmFunkel  We will be reviewing our favorite Found Footage movies.  In order to get a better idea as to what this genre might include, check out this post by Tim.

Please get me your submissions by the 25th of December by sending them to TisTheFFSeason@movierob.net  Try to think out of the box! Great choice Tim!

Let’s see what Jordan thought of this movie:

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Now this here is one a trip of a movie. Made locally in my home state of South Australia, it does a fantastic job of managing a meagre budget, using one or two sets, and only three actors. And that is all that it needs. I had read about this making the round at festivals and getting almost universal praise, and I can certainly see why. This is definitely not your average time travel movie, nor is it very sappy or sentimental at all, despite the romantic element driving the film.

This romantic basis becomes not so romantic as Dean, an obsessive control freak, is intent on recreating a perfect holiday from a year previous for his partner Lana. She scoffs at the idea and comments on Dean’s obsessive and controlling nature, but seeing his invention, she becomes intrigued. From here, the story travels into interesting territory, as when the characters begin to time-travel, they start to see… Versions of themselves, from the past, or the future. It is sometimes hard to tell. Once more and more versions of Dean start to appear, it reeeally starts to become a trip, and somewhat of a puzzle.

Dean starts becomes jealous of… himself, albeit himself from the future, as each new Dean has become more confident, more in charge of the bizarre situation he has created. The way Josh McConville plays these parts is particularly noteworthy, as he essentially plays three or four characters, all different. The jealously he shows towards other versions of himself is quite hilarious. In fact, there were many laughs along these lines.

Dean is nerdy – he built this machine – and he is also prone to crying unnecessarily. A kink in his plan occurs with the sudden appearance of Dean’s partner’s ex-lover, who wants to crash the party and win his girl back; and he doesn’t plan on leaving. This self-obsessed, brilliantly conceived character is hilariously exaggerated. He is an Aussie Greek who is amusingly obsessed with his Olympic level javelin skills (a javelin he carries with him where ever he goes), and is proud of his Greek heritage. What makes his character really work is that he is essentially the polar opposite to Dean, leaving Lana unsure of the man she wants to be with.

I can definitely see why this got the attention it did. It is a fascinating puzzle of a movie, one which I want to see again as soon as I can so I can piece it all together. It is certainly one of those movies that thoroughly deserves multiple viewings, despite its low-budget, a single set, and three actors. It is economic filmmaking at its best, as the small budget does not limit the movie at all. In fact, I have always thought that a limited budget almost always breeds creativity.