Chatter Box Film

Obex is a surreal low budget 80s set fantasy adventure.

With whiffs of Hundreds of Beavers this low budget film is proudly wearing its influences of surrealist Lynch and mumblecore on the surface.

Conor Marsh’s life is turned upside-down when he plays a new computer game and his beloved dog, Sandy disappears. Conor sets out on a quest to rescue his dog. Throughout, he is having to deal with his demons and the skeletons in his closet as he becomes one with a new game (imagine a low bit Tron).

The spirit of Romero echoes also throughout this film – flimsy skeletons, a character with a computer for a head. In other realms of movie-making this would be laughed at, but the conviction and commitment shown by lead actor is quite revealing as we grow more empathy to his quest for his missing dog, Sandy.

Much like Beavers, there is a witty invention and zest of creativity running throughout the film that is revelatory as we see movie studios being bought and sold for hundreds of billions of dollars. If you properly budget, good works of art can be achieved. Works that can spawn fandom and appreciation, thus a new generation will create something themselves.

Underneath, the film is saying a lot about the addiction of computer gaming and reliance upon television during the mid-1980s, how the consumerism of the Reagan-era spawned a weaker mindset amongst these new consumers.

Shot as if from a bygone era, this is a spiritual cousin to Computer Chess – the valedictorian mumblecore showpiece – this is a film that is nostalgic but not sentimental. This birth of home computers is being treated as a nervous occasion, a new landscape of worlds to be conquered and this film is a paean to those early beginnings.

Obex is out on Blu-Ray and Digital from 9th March, from Lightbulb Distribution.

My thanks to Strike Media for the review opportunity.