OLD JOY

A simple film that consists of a director, writer and team of actors who I don't know at all. Simple shouldn't be thought of a negative though and in fact is what really won me over. All the film does is tell the story of two friends who haven't seen each other in many years, perhaps almost a decade, who reconnect for a short camping journey. There really is no more plot then that. They don't get into the woods and have a homosexual romance or even get attacked by some weird forest monster. The story is so simple that it is something that one day down the line all of us will run into if we haven't yet, which is why the film is so perfect. Everyone knows they have friends who they have fallen out of contact with and this film documents what happens when people reconnect with those individuals. Perhaps one of you has succeeded and one has failed, one has followed their dreams and one has sold out to the man. Whatever the case is it is an experience each one of us will likely face one day and while nothing dramatic is happening on the exterior, most of the time the interior drama is endless. What to say? What you remember? I give Old Joy a 9/10, for documenting life and nothing else, but coming a little short in some departments. At only 90 minutes the film leaves too many areas unexplored.

9/10