Stories of Lost Souls

Stories of Lost Souls (2006) was one of those rare delightful surprises in life—like picking up a penny from the ground and realizing that it’s a Mercury dime. In this case, I can only blame the folks at marketing for my low expectations. The DVD package said that this anthology collection was like The Twilight Zone and the title and packaging seem to indicate a low-key Tales from the Crypt or Outer Limits. In fact, Stories of Lost Souls is a collection of short films that were produced between 1999 and 2004 that were put together with a loose idea of theme added in circa 2006 to string them together. The sum of the parts here is better than expected from the way the whole is put together. It would have just made more sense to say “Here are several short films….Enjoy!” than to retroactively force a theme onto these films. (But then, I firmly believe in the greatness of the short film as an artistic medium.) As for the content of the films, the menu and its background music seem to indicate the title should be “Stories from a Winter in Purgatory.” It’s all very ominous, and that really colored my perception of the first film. The only other framing device is a tagline that precedes each film that indicates “Lost in” something.

1. “A Whole New Day” (1999 dir. William Garcia)
The tagline for this one was “Lost in a daze…” and that would have sufficed for a title for this film as well. In a way, this film benefited from the suspense generated by the Twilight Zone-ish marketing because I spent the whole time waiting for the other shoe to drop. James Gandolfini (as Vincent) is a less musical and less likeable version of his character from Romance & Cigarettes. He wakes up hungover in an empty apartment which he thinks is his own. For a while we are led to suspect there’s been a rift in the space-time continuum causing him to exist in an alternate reality. Instead, it turns out he woke up in the wrong apartment. Oops. I was a little relieved when I realized that these were not in fact going to be spooky stories, but still, how you’d have to be pretty drunk to go into an empty apartment and black out and you’d have to be severely hung over (and more than a little paranoid) to not figure out the truth sooner than Vincent does. Not bad for an opener, but I think it benefits most from the element of surprise about the kind of short film it is.

2. “Euston Road” (2004 dir. Toa Stappard)
If you’ve ever played the London edition of Monopoly you have the key clue to solving this short mystery. Paul Bettany is brilliant as Y (no, it’s not a Samuel Beckett film) a man with a proposition. The whole thing is clever—it’s like the shortest heist film of all time and the end-credit sequence is worthy of a Bond film. Not every short film has such memorable dialogue, but I really love it when Y says “You can be a sick puppy when you put your mind to it. So come on, put your mind to it.” Get yourself a bottle of champagne and treat yourself to this one.

3. “New Year’s Eve” (2002 dir. Col Spector)
This one played out like a Seinfeld episode as written by John Osborne. It’s New Year’s Eve and British Seinfeld (Stephen Mangan) and his friend British Kenny G (Amit Lahav) are headed to a party hosted by a friend of a friend’s girlfriend. They get guilted into inviting their cab driver up to the posh party. Seinfeld shows up and immediately embarrasses his friend British Paul Rudd (Bohdan Poraj) with the following exchange.

David: Where are the actresses?
Michael: This is not a cattle market.
David: No, I know that…where are the actresses?

So David ends up spending the night talking to Leah (Keira Knightley) who says she’s 17 but turns out to be 15. So, Faux Rudd’s girlfriend makes him throw Limey Seinfeld out of the party. Don’t expect too much out of this. I’m a big fan of Keira Knightley, but there’s not much to work with here and even if she’s not 15 or 17, it’s a little creepy seeing her flirting with someone who looks like Seinfeld.

Meanwhile the cab driver (Philip Herbert) has an argument about art with the host’s kid (“My father paid a lot of money for that painting.” “Well, he wasted it then.”)is confused by a woman doing a terrible Robert De Niro impersonation (“I’m the taxi driver.” “You talkin’ to me?” “Yes.”) and proceeds to get so high on the wacky backy that he can’t drive anywhere.

The highlight of this film is one of the interactions that Matt, the man who stole Kenny G’s hair, has with a flirty girl after she reveals that she has a boyfriend.

Matt: Why do women always do that…flirt and give the impression that they’re single?
Flirty Helen: It’s a shame we didn’t meet six months ago. I was really desperate to meet someone then.
Matt: Thanks.

Yeah, that about killed me. I’m never going to another party again. I’m just going to work on getting a time machine so I can find the people who were available six months ago.

4. “Standing Room Only” (2004 dir. Deborra-Lee Furness)
This is by far the best film in this anthology. It’s brilliant, it has an all-star cast and it’s almost a silent movie. The director is Mrs. Hugh Jackman, which explains Hugh Jackman’s presence in it. The cast includes Michael Gambon, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Joanna Lumley and Sophie Dahl, but the real star is Andy Serkis who proves that he is the new Lon Chaney. This is the best film about waiting in line for show tickets ever. Any more words in praise of it would be pointless.

5. “Sniper 470” (2002 dir. Paul Holmes)
This one’s for the sci-fi fans. It’s a story of a space-sniper (Billy Boyd) who resides in his own private asteroid fortress of Navarone in an alternating life of sheer boredom punctuated by terror. The sheer boredom is demonstrated by the bags of liquid vegetarian main dishes that he consumes, taking out the space trash and seeing the space cockroaches scurrying around. The terror is shown first as a series of vague radar splotches that our gunner takes shots at, but eventually we get war at its most personal and terrifying. We never know what it’s all about, and though we do get to see the face of the enemy it doesn’t answer any questions. This is a great short film and it has remarkably good effects.

6. “Bangers” (1999 dir. Andrew Upton)
Andrew Upton is Mr. Cate Blanchett, which explains her presence in this one. (Maybe they should have called it “Stories of Nepotism” or “Spousal Shorts.”)
This film veers into Pinterland or Beckettville as it consists mostly of a monologue delivered by Julie-Anne (Cate Blanchett) while talking to her cat, Mr. Funny Bones and making dinner for herself and her mother after a long day at the office. It has some creepy funny moments, some creepy scary moments, some creepy and vaguely sensual but somewhat funny moments (rubbing up against a catsup bottle, nearly sitting on some sausages and the furious whipping motions of mashing potatoes that looks at first like something else entirely.) I’m not sure if we’re watching a character slip into insanity or, (and this is more frightening) if this is about as normal as it gets for Julie-Ann. The only thing keeping it from being funny is the feeling that it might actually be as terrifying as “Sniper 470” if you think about it too much.

So, overall, this is a great collection of short films that I highly recommend. Bring over some bangers and mash, and you’ll have a good time with this collection.