GRAVITY WAS EVERYWHERE BACK THEN (Brent Green, U.S.). 72 minutes. Rating: NN
There’s always one experimental documentary that aims big and misses completely. This year it’s Brent Green’s candy-coloured hipster fable about a Kentucky hardware store clerk who retrofitted the home he shared with his wife into a sort of healing chamber after she fell ill.
Though it’s initially intriguing, Green’s handmade aesthetic quickly becomes insufferable, and every artistic choice the director makes – shooting his actors in a form of stop-motion, reading the narration as though he’s constantly on the verge of tears – works against the story’s emotional impact. It’s like watching a long-form Bright Eyes video.
