Telephone World – Review
By Lynn Sorel
Rating: 4 out of 10
Synopsis: Telephone World tells the story of Rachel Plasky (Elissa Dowling), who finds out she got the lead part in a new TV show in one continuous 80-minute shot.
Our Thoughts: Telephone World has an original concept for a film, with being filmed in one continuous shot. However this makes the film extremely slow in executing it’s story. It’s filmed in almost a surreal way with what appears to be a hand held camera.
The film is basically Rachel Plasky’s day after finding out she got the part in a reality show. She’s at her home and alone for the majority of the film. A series of phone calls are really what drive the storyline. In between calls, Rachel does drugs and mundane activities. Her mother whom she doesn’t pick up the phone for, keeps calling and leaving messages about her father dying in the hospital. One of her friends, whose phone keeps cutting out, calls her to tell her that her boyfriend is going to dump her because she’s been pushing him, and her friends, for her career. She tries to call him but he doesn’t pick up, which leads to an emotional break down, followed by more self destructive behavior. She tries to lift her mood by focusing on her new TV role or petting her cat. With each call she becomes more broken down and spends much of the movie crying.
The film comes off more voyeuristic, watching someone’s like fall apart, than a movie. In my opinion it’s more of a drama than a thriller or horror film. There’s not a whole lot keeping the viewer interested other than seeing where this type of film will ultimately lead. Many of the things that I predicted would happen did. However it lacked the intensity I felt it was striving for. It does have artistic elements in its film style which are visually interesting. Elissa Dowling is excellent in her role as Rachel. I did find it amusing that in the credits it says “Icky the Cat” as himself. Over all I felt Telephone World was a strange film. I think it can be appreciated in the artistic sense, but it wasn’t really my cup of tea as a horror film.
