This is why independent movies are so much cooler than "Hollywood Blockbusters". An ending that is both happy and sad. For me at least. I don't want to ruin it for those of you that haven't seen it yet, but when you have a simple little story about a detective investigating his own daughter's death, it's overall not about the secrets you find incriminating your little girls good name, but how you're ultimately to blame for it, as a parent. Filmed in such tight quarters of her one bedroom apartment in Venice Beach, California, the claustrophobia has it's own mood and is as much of a character to the film as the cast is. This is where she is found dead with a man's belt around her neck and a camera set up at the foot of her bed. Of course the tape that is ejected from the camera has everything recorded on it up until the moment before she died, but maybe -just maybe, does any of the footage reveal who might have owned this belt. Mmm? This is where one, the haunt begins and two, Detective Lambord starts breaking every rule in the book to bring justice to Stephanie's murder. As he rummages through Stephanie's crime scene, he is not only searching for evidence to solve the case, but he is also relearning the daughter he grew apart from long ago. The movie jogs back and forth between Lambord's present world and Stephanie's dirty past. Effectively done by cutting between Lambord working and the footage of Stephanie as he watching tape after tape from a box of her home videos. Stephanie, though innocent, young, and beautiful on the outside, is nothing but a dark, man manipulating, sex addict that flirts with drugs and death every waking hour of her life. Addicted to recording herself and addicted to something rooted so deep inside of herself, you'll need to watch the film to find out what that is, it shouldn't be too hard to find the killer.
Let's just say, guilt is a funny thing and to me when it comes down to it, Lambord has a few things he needs to get done before he closes this case. Find the killer, rediscover his daughter, semi finding forgiveness for not being apart of her life for so many years, and to hide what she has become so she can be remembered the way he remembers her as a child. That being said, enjoy the film. There is plenty of nudity, one questionable scene containing some pretty real looking masturbation, some new faces we're not use to seeing in every movie that plays in the theater, and of course James Duval. I love this guy. Ever since "The Doomed Generation", "Go", "Donnie Darko", "Nowhere". He's just awesome. And this movie holds up with the best of all the "mainstream" underground independent movies that make and keep Hollywood scared for their bottom line.
