One and the Same

Very interesting concept that was vaguely explored, resulting in a poor execution, but the story still kept my interest. This concept is hard to thoroughly explore because you have to be able to coherently piece it all together at the end with a central idea. It is a valiant attempt at trying to venture new concepts.

I don't want to write a long winded review but this movie had a lot going on and still manage to be an intriguing watch. In general, I'm kind of picky about choosing anything with drama because I hate seeing stupid people make stupid decisions and wallow in pity because they cause of self inflicted pain. That trope is still prevalent in this movie, but not entirely unrealistic. I think it was overly ambitious that couldn't fulfill all the aspects of the story, but still a commendable attempt.

Now to the nitty gritty about why this film has a great basis but fails to deliver. Scientifically, energy transference makes complete sense and can hold up well for the most part, but the main problem is they barely scratch the surface of information. In order to understand this concept to the fullest the explanation needs to be fleshed out to make a cohesive story about how this energy flows in life, whether it follows a pattern or not. Without that explanation, most of the actions throughout seem too coincidental, and come off as lazy writing. The idea of energy coming back and being identified through humans electromagnetic field is a good concept to explore and can serve as a logical reason as to why we encounter certain people throughout our lifetime. It seemed like they would make this a mind blowing experience, but the company that specializes in this area, in the film, could offer little to no answers and had minimal involvement in assisting the story line other than saying a supernatural phenomenon is happening.

In terms of the script and acting I was pretty lenient considering these were all unknown actors and tbh they did an alright job. They showed some corny moments but also some glimmers of impactful and emotional acting. I will say in some moments the script didn't help them. Some of the dialogue was corny no doubt. But then you would hear some interactions that sounded corny, but were very realistic to real conversations and the writing almost felt socially self aware of how conversations actually would go. However, neither of these properties overwhelming hurt or helped the project enough to have a definitive position in likability.

The character development is so far left weird it's hard to understand what they're going for. The main girl is an angsty civil activist/protestor who is a straight up bitch most of the time, yet there were definitely moments that I liked her, but for no reason at all really. Granted once you find out more info towards the end I guess it is plausible to have these 2 contrasting personalities based on their reasoning, but still, they kinda just throw stuff at you and just want you to take it as so.

Now the antagonist.. whew boy.. he'll make your blood boil from start to finish and for what reason? I really don't know but he does the job he needs to by making you loathe him. I do wish there was more introspective work or development on his character specifically, but I'm not upset because I get the gist. Aside from the 2 main leads, I actually enjoyed every character on screen. Some were quirky, some witty, and mostly endearing. They were also partially irrelevant and were present more so for emotional impact which still hits in some aspects.

Even as I list out the Pros and Cons for this this movie I still feel mixed about how I feel. On one hand this is an admirable effort and on the other it is a poorly executed idea that bit off more than it can chew. A part of me wants to give it a 7 stars and the other part wants me to give it a 5 stars. Regardless, this movie will probably reside in my thoughts way longer than I was expecting to, so I guess at least it's thought provoking???

The outline of the story is great. However, they add too much filler in the beginning, as they try to explain the climax. 50% of the first 3/4 of the story could be taken out, and that time used in the end, and this could have gotten more stars. If you're okay with a slow movie that has a good ending, then you may enjoy this.

M. Night Shyamalan-esque movie with original script and great acting! Look forward to Felipe Cisneros' future projects.

It is a rare movie that attempts to do something different, but this one tries, it really does. The execution is a bit muddled sadly, the script really needed to be tightened up, and while I got the gist of it, it got a bit too convoluted for it's own good by the end. I can understand why some hated this movie, though I don't feel hate is at all justified because outside of the convoluted somewhat muddled script, it is a good sci-fi endeavor. I would call it a solid B sci-fi movie, which I do not use B movie as a pejorative as a some do, I think there is a place for low-budget and/or B movies.

I also felt the script spent too much time trying to hide the main thrust of the film, there are some twist, but the main thrust of the story is given away in the title, so I don't understand why they spend so much time attempting to conceal it. This is why the script gets a bit convoluted and muddled, because of it's attempted concealment of the main thread of the story. The movie is set in the late 1990's, but it never really uses that setting, one of the character's glasses would NEVER have been worn in the 1990's, I know because I grew up then. This style came back into fashion much later. The clothes also do not look like 1990's clothes, nor do the hair styles. The cars seem to mostly because from that era or earlier, but it just doesn't do a good job of looking like the late 1990's.

On the positive side, most of the acting is good(outside of the opening seen where the acting was pretty bad), the characters are decent, it takes time to build them up a bit and flesh them out, I really enjoyed that aspect, and it was interesting to see what happened to each character. Even though the female lead is basically an Antifa-like rioter(she throws Molotov cocktails, that crosses the into into rioting, and even says "say his name" late in the movie), and isn't the nicest person, I still liked her, crazy I know, as real-life Antifa rioters are some pretty vile nasty people. This movie is truly a tragedy, there is no happy ending, and the movie is filled with misery at every turn. From dead parents, to abusive parents, to rape, this movie is really about cycles of abuse and hatred. I have watched several movies with this theme, another, significantly less well-made film about a similar topic was "It Knows", and I would rank this much higher, "One and the Same" is a good movie, with a good concept, but because of it's attempts to conceal it's main plot point for so long, it will confuse a lot of people, and needlessly so.

I found the anachronisms quite amusing. Given that, I think that the cinematography was a bit lacking.

I liked the story and the premise, akin to 'Brainstorm' but they missed one central thing...the scanning...what was it for?

Of course, the story was great, but the execution, that was middling. If they would have used the scans just a bit more, they would have gotten a '9' but I'll have to stick to a '7' for good effort.

-J-