On Demand Weekly

On Demand Weekly provides new movie reviews of movies on demand from the POV of watching from the comfort of your home. Today’s review: ENGAGEMENT (FilmBuff).

ENGAGEMENT
Don’t trust anyone. Ever.
By Kate Asche Wilson

There are times in my life when I like to watch films that have big cheesy romantic endings. Then there are times when I enjoy to get mentally ruined by films that make me question my very existence, and leave me with an intense fear of mirrors. ENGAGEMENT is the later and is so subtly disturbing that by the end of the film...

you’ll be holding yourself in a corner while

questioning every relationship you’ve ever had.

If you’re in the mood for slow motion running, sweet embraces, and overly choreographed dance numbers turn back now. Seriously leave. I’m sure Step Up 16 will be hitting theatres soon. But if you frequently have brunch with Darren Aronofsky and have posters of Freddy Krueger in your room than this is the perfect film for you.

ENGAGEMENT, written and directed by Jon Lefkovitz, follows newly engaged Henry (Andrew Perez) as he discovers that his fiancée Carolyn (Erika Rankin) has an identical twin sister that she conveniently never told him about. When Carolyn leaves town for a few weeks to help her mother in New York, her sister Laura (played by Erika Rankin as well) temporarily moves in with Henry in his apartment in Los Angeles. It is obvious that Henry is sexually deprived so good call Carolyn having your slutty and psychotic other personality come to visit. That’s certainly going to work out well for everyone.

After hyperventilating for about ten minutes after this film ended I finally composed myself enough to group my thoughts into these three categories: The Good, The Bad, and The Horrifyingly Disturbing.

The Good:

The subtlety in the writing. Every single word in this script has a purpose. I had to re watch it just to catch everything, and I still don’t know what exactly was real and what wasn’t. At first I believed the Carolyn/Laura was the psychotic one and wanted poor Henry to run like hell to escape her insanity.

But then there are moments where Henry is a creeper and watches Laura undress. Not to mention he is basically a serial loner whose friend Tony is the only other person he speaks to in the whole film. That is not normal Henry! Did you meet Carolyn online? This is not the type of thriller where you fear horrifying demons that lurk behind Patrick Wilson. This is the type of film that makes you question everything you ever thought was real. This is the type of film that makes me worry that I’m in a straight jacket somewhere creating an alternate reality for myself.

The Bad: