Watershed were showing Skeletons this week and I managed to catch a screening that was followed by a Q&A with the director and a couple of the cast.
Winner of the “Best New British Feature Film” award at the Edinburgh film festival, none of the reviews/synopses I’ve read really do the film justice. The premise is that there’s these two guys who are like psychic cleaners who provide the service of airing the skeletons in your closet which gives some good comedy moments early on but that’s not really what the story is about. Most of the action revolves around a single job with a quirky family in an isolated country house and it’s here that the characters are developed and the story really happens. It’s not easily pigeon-holed – it’s kind of a comedy, but in a dark, British way, but it’s about loss and people finding themselves through each other. The film has resulted in writer/director Nick Whitfield being called a British Charlie Kaufman and there are definitely hints of the surreal worlds of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Being John Malkovich where disbelief is very much suspended.
Unfortunately, although the screening I saw was sold out, there aren’t many opportunities to see Skeletons at the cinema at the moment. Here’s a list. It’s a shame because it’s a quirky British film that deserves a wider audience than it’s getting.
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