Ten ’til Noon

Here’s a no-budget indie that succeeds for most of its 80 minutes by putting most of its creativity into an area so often neglected by its big-budget cousins: The script. It’s the same story told from different viewpoints, and with that sort of tale you always think first of Rashomon. If you’re not that much of a film student, you might be reminded of Pulp Fiction. But while Kurosawa’s masterpiece concerned the differing points of view of the characters and Tarantino’s story wound around a set of events, this one examines just ten minutes in time. Quite a challenge. Every ten minutes the clock is reset, and we learn a little more about what’s really going on. The tension builds wonderfully. We get six of these iterations … and then we go beyond noon, and I’m sorry to say the writer didn’t know how to get out of the box he had built in a satisfactory manner. But he sure had me going up to that point. The acting is very good, from a lot of people you’ve never heard of, but may, someday. I was most impressed by Jenya Lano, as the enigmatic Ms. Milch, of whom the IMDb has almost nothing to say except to list her credits (mostly TV and no-budget indies). I wouldn’t be surprised to see her make it big … or not. It’s a cruel business.