But I did not.
Yes, Kyle Edward Ball's audaciously odd directorial debut is about 25-30 minutes too long, edited in such a way that too many shots overstay their welcome.
Yes, it is filmed in a manner to seemingly intentionally test an audience's patience with still shots that hide the characters' faces and set aside narrative momentum in favor of metaphorical experimentation.
This will bother, and clearly has bothered, a lot of people. And I get it. It's not what they wanted. No hard feelings to these people. But now I want to talk about why I loved this film.
I was absolutely gripped by Skinamarink. I found so much depth and meaning to come from its bare-bones visual and aural presentation.
It's so, so ambiguous. But that didn't bother me because rather than showing bizarre imagery for the sake of it like so many experimental films, Ball instead keeps a GREAT deal of unknown in each frame.
The creaky, eerie sound complimented the ever-shifting static of the cinematography to make my brain play all kinds of tricks on me. A handful of horrifying disturbing images make an appearance throughout the film, but the constant wondering of "what was that sound" or "did I see something move in the frame" made me just as on edge throughout.
Though short on plot, I still found surprising thematic/character depth in each of the movie's unsettling, eerie frames of a single house.
We don't get to know much about Kevin and Kaylee, but we know what kind of relationship they have as young siblings from the film's opening scenes, and it is so soul-crushing to see what happens and doesn't happen to them over the story's nightmarish happenings.
As these kids are stalked in their house by something unknown and unseen, the horrifying things we see and hear are so clearly indicative of common childhood fears, traumas, and challenges: divorce, nightmares, abandonment, neglect, death, and a lack of control over your own choices.
Seeing them play out on screen in such an uncanny way was so sad and so terrifying. The film's lack of a musical score, lack of concrete answers, piercing sound design, and ability to turn the intimacies of childhood into faceless, unknowable antagonists all made this one of the scariest movies I have ever seen.
Yes, Kyle Edward Ball's audaciously odd directorial debut is about 25-30 minutes too long, edited in such a way that too many shots overstay their welcome.
Yes, it is filmed in a manner to seemingly intentionally test an audience's patience with still shots that hide the characters' faces and set aside narrative momentum in favor of metaphorical experimentation.
This will bother, and clearly has bothered, a lot of people. And I get it. It's not what they wanted. No hard feelings to these people. But now I want to talk about why I loved this film.
I was absolutely gripped by Skinamarink. I found so much depth and meaning to come from its bare-bones visual and aural presentation.
It's so, so ambiguous. But that didn't bother me because rather than showing bizarre imagery for the sake of it like so many experimental films, Ball instead keeps a GREAT deal of unknown in each frame.
The creaky, eerie sound complimented the ever-shifting static of the cinematography to make my brain play all kinds of tricks on me. A handful of horrifying disturbing images make an appearance throughout the film, but the constant wondering of "what was that sound" or "did I see something move in the frame" made me just as on edge throughout.
Though short on plot, I still found surprising thematic/character depth in each of the movie's unsettling, eerie frames of a single house.
We don't get to know much about Kevin and Kaylee, but we know what kind of relationship they have as young siblings from the film's opening scenes, and it is so soul-crushing to see what happens and doesn't happen to them over the story's nightmarish happenings.
As these kids are stalked in their house by something unknown and unseen, the horrifying things we see and hear are so clearly indicative of common childhood fears, traumas, and challenges: divorce, nightmares, abandonment, neglect, death, and a lack of control over your own choices.
Seeing them play out on screen in such an uncanny way was so sad and so terrifying. The film's lack of a musical score, lack of concrete answers, piercing sound design, and ability to turn the intimacies of childhood into faceless, unknowable antagonists all made this one of the scariest movies I have ever seen.