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Use of Audio
There was some really great music in this film. There were some brief montage-type moments with good underlying music, plus some truly sad and heartbreaking strains for the scenes in which Ana is going through withdrawal. I’d be interested to see if Zero Productions will be putting out any kind of soundtrack for Welcome Says the Angel.
The sound design is pretty good as well, though occasionally it looked as though some of it may have been dubbed, particularly one part at the beginning where Charlie the bartender is singing a song. Though given the overall look of the film – and the fact that it seems intentionally low-quality – this minor dubbing issue isn’t that big a deal.
Use of Budget
If this film had been shot digitally, $20,000 would be a little high. There are very few characters, only two major sets – the bar and Ana’s apartment – and both of these places were sparsely furnished. However, the cost of the 16mm film that this film was shot and processing was probably nearly $15,000, so the total of $20,000 is pretty impressive for a 90 minute feature shot on 16mm. (Remember that Kevin Smith’s film, Clerks, was $27,000 with much of the cost of it going for the 16mm film he shot it on.)
Lasting Appeal
Though we like to think that most movie-goers are far removed from the drug-ridden underbelly of the inner city, that may not always be the case. The trend of middle-class drug addicts is a growing one, and most people are just now beginning to realize that fact, evidenced by the prevalence of shows like A&E’s Intervention, or movies such as Requiem For a Dream or the Academy Award-winning American Beauty. I’m sure there would be plenty of people who could identify with these characters in some form or another.
Overall Comment
This type of story will never really be finished. Even though the movie comes to an end, the audience is painfully aware that – were these characters real – this cycle would keep perpetuating itself over and over again. For, as Charlie the bartender observed, “You can’t get somebody to leave the place they wanna be.” So Joshua and Ana will probably find themselves stuck in this cycle for as long as it takes for Ana to finally decide that she wants to stop.
Though it’s only a movie, the truly heartbreaking reality of Welcome Says The Angel is that we all know that this type of story happens every day for hundreds of thousands of people in the world.
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Content |
8.8 |
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Visual
Look |
9.0 |
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Use
of Audio |
9.6 |
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Use
of Budget |
8.8 |
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Lasting
Appeal |
9.0 |
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Overall
Score |
9.0
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The
author of half a dozen screen plays, two novels, and a proficient
camera-woman in her own right, Monika
DeLeeuw-Taylor is Microfilmmaker's lead writing analyst and
one of our top film reviewers. When she's not writing a critique for
Microfilmmaker, she's writing screenplays for Viking Productions.
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