The best way I can approach this movie is to compare it to a similar discovery situation, Night Watch. Occasionally these small movies come out that nobody has ever heard of that suddenly appear on the rental wall in the midst of all the noise, with an appealing cover that reveals a visual experience different from the norm. When Night Watch appeared, however, I was mostly disappointed by a poorly written fantasy movie of the usual tropes with directing and editing that tried its damnedest to be completely unwatchable. When I discovered Ink, the first interpretation was that I had gone down the same path--only for the movie to slowly reveal it's true nature as a slyly paced, WELL-written fantasy... .of the usual tropes.
Part of the difficulty in getting into this movie is the seven different beginnings it has. It honestly takes a while for the plot to build any momentum, and I fear quite a lot of people may be turned off of the movie before it reaches it's full velocity. The story is about a man named John, separated from his daughter, who has to rediscover his shame and get knocked out of his escapist over-successful capitalist life before his and his daughter's soul is lost. Instead of being a metaphorical drama, however, the characters are revealed through a parallel universe of Storytellers and Incubi. Storytellers are dream creators that go house to house spreading cheer and hope in people's sleep. Incubi, thus, are the demonic flashy-eyed people straight from Sin City and The City of Lost Children that are the necessary foils, spreading bad dreams and despair. A mysterious, ugly, shrouded man named Ink appears and steals John's daughter from her guardian Storyteller so that he can take them to the Incubi and become an Incubus himself. This theft then becomes a journey of redemption as the daughter's Storyteller in the parallel world and John in the real world have to come to the aide of the daughter--without ever having contact with each other, and in John's case, without even knowing he's on a quest.
Admittedly, as fantasy movies go this one screams of a writer/director who has read way too much Neil Gaiman. Nevertheless, for that particular sub-set of fantasy genre (the parallel universe as journey for character change in the real world) is a successful formula, and the visual aspects of this movie are quite unique. The editing will turn off anybody who likes the camera to linger for more than a second on anyone's face but, as annoying and jumpy as it gets I can't honestly say it wasn't without purpose, as Jamin Winans is aiming for a beat and the fighting sequences pop in a way that I haven't seen before. What happens with this movie is, it starts to seem like it isn't going anywhere and that the style is causing the narrative to fall apart until a sequence where the beat of the world is revealed from a man named the Pathfinder, at which point the internal logic of the movie finally click into place, the gears start turning, and the rest of the pieces fall into order. It is unfortunate that it takes so long for the movie to get to that place, but on the other hand most of the first half is just trying to figure out how to get all of the many elements of the story introduced, and the low-budget production value of the thing reveals they didn't have much options.
Which brings me back to my comparison with Night Watch. Night Watch's problems entirely consist of the fact that the director, Timur Bekmambetov, doesn't give a crap about what happens in the story as long as he gets to show off the thousands of different shots he thinks makes the movie look bad-ass. The result is a frustratingly stylistic movie where nothing can be seen because it cuts too fast and the twist at the end makes no sense whatsoever. Ink is the glad foil to that, a stylistic movie that shows off thousands of different shots that make the movie look bad-ass, mostly because the director is trying to fit so much information into what eventually builds into a story that he originally has a bit of difficulty telling. It's not a perfect movie by any means, and it may not get Winans a deal to make some egregiously over-budgeted movie like Wanted, but what it really reveals ultimately is that even crazy digital fantasies such as these are within reach of imperfect storytellers who nevertheless want to make a special effects movie and get it distributed.
Did I mention distribution? Oh yeah. By the way: distributors turned from this as a lost cause because unlike Night Watch, it didn't get Quentin Tarantino's seal of approval. The result? Bittorrent fame as Ink was released on the Internet to garner word of mouth praise. The result? Ink is now on DVD. Like this year's Paranormal Activity, Ink is revealing what people have been talking about whimsically for the past decade: cheap digital equipment is making even the most SFX-filled fantasy movie ideas accessible to independent filmmakers with a vision and a story to tell. It's happening now. The result? Who knows, but without an ounce of irony I say this movie is better than Transformers 3 will be.
I have also seen a short movie by Winans called "Spin", and so far it seems he is a director interested in the musical beat of movies and how they can affect the -- literal -- pace of narrative. It'll be interesting to see if he develops these ideas further and how many different ways he can go about it.
--PolarisDiB
Part of the difficulty in getting into this movie is the seven different beginnings it has. It honestly takes a while for the plot to build any momentum, and I fear quite a lot of people may be turned off of the movie before it reaches it's full velocity. The story is about a man named John, separated from his daughter, who has to rediscover his shame and get knocked out of his escapist over-successful capitalist life before his and his daughter's soul is lost. Instead of being a metaphorical drama, however, the characters are revealed through a parallel universe of Storytellers and Incubi. Storytellers are dream creators that go house to house spreading cheer and hope in people's sleep. Incubi, thus, are the demonic flashy-eyed people straight from Sin City and The City of Lost Children that are the necessary foils, spreading bad dreams and despair. A mysterious, ugly, shrouded man named Ink appears and steals John's daughter from her guardian Storyteller so that he can take them to the Incubi and become an Incubus himself. This theft then becomes a journey of redemption as the daughter's Storyteller in the parallel world and John in the real world have to come to the aide of the daughter--without ever having contact with each other, and in John's case, without even knowing he's on a quest.
Admittedly, as fantasy movies go this one screams of a writer/director who has read way too much Neil Gaiman. Nevertheless, for that particular sub-set of fantasy genre (the parallel universe as journey for character change in the real world) is a successful formula, and the visual aspects of this movie are quite unique. The editing will turn off anybody who likes the camera to linger for more than a second on anyone's face but, as annoying and jumpy as it gets I can't honestly say it wasn't without purpose, as Jamin Winans is aiming for a beat and the fighting sequences pop in a way that I haven't seen before. What happens with this movie is, it starts to seem like it isn't going anywhere and that the style is causing the narrative to fall apart until a sequence where the beat of the world is revealed from a man named the Pathfinder, at which point the internal logic of the movie finally click into place, the gears start turning, and the rest of the pieces fall into order. It is unfortunate that it takes so long for the movie to get to that place, but on the other hand most of the first half is just trying to figure out how to get all of the many elements of the story introduced, and the low-budget production value of the thing reveals they didn't have much options.
Which brings me back to my comparison with Night Watch. Night Watch's problems entirely consist of the fact that the director, Timur Bekmambetov, doesn't give a crap about what happens in the story as long as he gets to show off the thousands of different shots he thinks makes the movie look bad-ass. The result is a frustratingly stylistic movie where nothing can be seen because it cuts too fast and the twist at the end makes no sense whatsoever. Ink is the glad foil to that, a stylistic movie that shows off thousands of different shots that make the movie look bad-ass, mostly because the director is trying to fit so much information into what eventually builds into a story that he originally has a bit of difficulty telling. It's not a perfect movie by any means, and it may not get Winans a deal to make some egregiously over-budgeted movie like Wanted, but what it really reveals ultimately is that even crazy digital fantasies such as these are within reach of imperfect storytellers who nevertheless want to make a special effects movie and get it distributed.
Did I mention distribution? Oh yeah. By the way: distributors turned from this as a lost cause because unlike Night Watch, it didn't get Quentin Tarantino's seal of approval. The result? Bittorrent fame as Ink was released on the Internet to garner word of mouth praise. The result? Ink is now on DVD. Like this year's Paranormal Activity, Ink is revealing what people have been talking about whimsically for the past decade: cheap digital equipment is making even the most SFX-filled fantasy movie ideas accessible to independent filmmakers with a vision and a story to tell. It's happening now. The result? Who knows, but without an ounce of irony I say this movie is better than Transformers 3 will be.
I have also seen a short movie by Winans called "Spin", and so far it seems he is a director interested in the musical beat of movies and how they can affect the -- literal -- pace of narrative. It'll be interesting to see if he develops these ideas further and how many different ways he can go about it.
--PolarisDiB