By RILEY SPELLMAN
On Monday, the Roxy Theater in Potsdam featured a local film premiere for Dissection of an Olive—twice actually, because the first viewing sold out and the theater was generous enough to run it again. This film was created by a crew of North Country residents: Summer Dorr as writer and director; Kamal Turner as assistant director and Actor; Jesse Clark Stone as executive producer; Ben Hull as cinematographer and editor; and the actors included (to name a few) visiting professor Chris Clarke (as a lead and as the acting coach), professor Ann Marie Gardinier Halstead, and former PCA SLU student Craig Conroy (makes a few appearances). Kaelynn Hong plays the female lead, Olive.
Dorr noted that most of the actors in the film were originally theater actors, and only one or two had ever been in a feature film before, which was interesting. Dictionary Of We Productions produced this avant-garde film.
The 69-minute movie had an intriguing, intelligent script acted out by gifted actors, and the cinematography was visually pleasing and fun. If you appreciate a good indie film and yet also like the mental workout of movies like Christopher Nolan’s Memento, you’ll find this film a fine blend. Also, music from the band Swimming in Speakers, which has been featured on such shows as Grey’s Anatomy, was used in the film.
The plot surrounds the themes of grief and intimacy (as the movie itself notes in a teasing manner), and also projection of the lead character, Olive’s, emotions into her own characters in the screenplay she’s writing, as a way to escape. Also, there was a strong theme of family dynamics, and dysfunctional relationships as a result of broken homes in relation to that initial theme. All in all, it was an intriguing film.
