CINEMA: Helen

This is a British film that won’t be scooping many accolades as it is more an experiment in filmmaking than a complete, finished product. Made for pocket money and featuring an unknown (and mostly amateur) cast, this is less of a straight narrative tale and more of a mood portrait.

Helen (Annie Townsend) is the product of the British care system and as she approaches her eighteenth birthday must face the transition from social care into the big wide world where she must fend for herself. However, when she is chosen to be the stand-in for a reconstruction of a young girl’s disappearance, her world dramatically opens up. The missing girl, Joy, had a whole life, a “normal” life, so different to Helen’s own she finds she wants to explore what it would be like to actually be Joy. She befriends Joy’s parents and boyfriend, retraces her footsteps on the day she disappeared and tries to be just like her. It’s an interesting idea but it makes for a film that moves at a snail’s pace.

At times it is so surreal and somnambulant you feel like giving it a good prod in order to wake it up. Filmmakers Christine Molly and Joe Lawlor demonstrate some nice camera moves but unless you are a film student this could send you to sleep.

Dee Pilgrim