- Starring
- Baize Buzan, Allison Torem, Tim Hopper
- Writer
- Bradley Grant Smith
- Director
- Bradley Grant Smith
- Rating
- n/a
- Running Time
- 96 minutes
- Release Date
- n/a
Overall Score
Rating Summary
This will be one of many reviews during this year’s SXSW Film Festival, to keep up with our latest coverage, click here.
The theme of estranged siblings reconnecting over tragedy has been covered countless times in countless films and for the most part, Our Father is no different for better or worse. Unfortunately in this film’s case, it has far too much to balance and too little time to do it, trying to redeem said characters and reconnecting their bond in a satisfying way while connecting it all to their troubled family history was far too much to do thus lessening its overall impact. That being said, the pieces were certainly there but they just couldn’t quite come together. The story of course follows a pair of sisters named Beta (Buzan) and Zelda (Torem) who reunite following the tragic death of their father and set out to find their previously unknown uncle Gerry who may very well be the answer to the circumstances behind their father’s death and their family dysfunction.
As sisters, Beta and Zelda couldn’t be any more different as they found each other at different stages of their lives. Regardless of where they may have been, they needed to come together and finding Gerry and truth about their father was what they needed for themselves individually and to strengthen their bond as siblings. Like life, that journey over the course of Our Father was not exactly a straightforward one with some predictable bumps along the way though may be too slow for some. However, the lack of character development made it hard to care about any of it as they seemingly did little towards the film’s inevitable ending. Despite that, the sensational performances from Buzan and Torem as Beta and Zelda and their chemistry at least kept things interesting.
At the end of the day, Our Father is essentially more of the same but as far as this film concerned, this one falls near the middle of what is available.
still courtesy of SXSW
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The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.
