Cashback (Ellis, 2006)IMDB Link“Cashback” has an intriguing concept. An artist has a breakup with his girlfriend, gets depressed, can’t sleep, so he works in a supermarket, and he spends his time, by freezing time. This can either be a science-fiction concept or more metaphorical, and while the former would have been more fun, the movie takes it as latter. He does not ACTUALLY freeze time, but only is able to do it in his mind because he is an artist who likes drawing still life, so he has a great eye for detail and a big imagination. Which means the concept of freezing time isn’t that fun to play around with, and he does it only a few times anyway.
The movie is mainly about a young man’s quest for love, and this is a quest that has been done many times before, mostly badly. “Cashback” seems to be slightly more mature in its subject, but I could not get into it. Neither the artist nor his love interest are that interesting, but worse even, are all the secondary characters, that are used for comic relief, but are hardly funny, such as your usual bad boss (take David Brent or Michael Scott from “The Office” without the wit), a guy who tries to pick up women but constantly has water thrown on his face (done a lot and only as a punch line, we don’t get to see what the guy says, which is the lead up to the punch line), a guy who practices kung fu (which is the only joke), and so on.
The movie is visually interesting, with both the still frames when time is stopped and some few good cuts. It is also a movie that started as a short film, and I think, it probably should have stayed that way.
2/5
