Short films work if there is a punch at the ending that
makes everything that came before it worth the wait. I cannot say that this has never been more
true than in director Adam O’Brien’s film A
Little Off The Top (2012). This is
the story of a hair stylist by the name of Sylvio (played by the charismatic
David Nerman) who has an old client by the name of Ingrid Clifford (Ingrid
Falaise) in his chair one evening.
Ingrid is now a star of which Sylvio helped mold and style her on her
way to the top only Ingrid has never credited Sylvio for his
contributions. Now that he has her in
his chair he will put the wrong things right whether she likes it or not.
For the most part the film seems to be held together by the
unnerving Sylvio who plays up his sin of envy very well. Nerman is magnetic in the role and since he
carries the whole film a less capable actor could have made this a disastrous
affair. Thankfully, Nerman brings the
right edge of jealousy to his Sylvio so that he never comes off as a caricature. The screenplay by Mathieu Demers and Christian
Rivest is precise with the right amount of dread and doom. O’Brien does the film justice by staying on
Sylvio for most of the film and leaving Ingrid to the periphery as we see
everything as he sees it. When Sylvio
presents his true intentions upon Ingrid it is a shock leaving the final punch
for those that stayed with the film till the bitter end. Like every good short film A Little Off The Top ends with a jolt
that you want soon forget.
O’Brien goes a long way to show that you don’t need much to
craft a good horror film but that little has to go a long way and in this film
it truly does.
To watch A Little Off the Top you can view on FearNet here -
http://www.fearnet.com/shorts/little-top
or visit the website BloodbathTV at http://bloodbathtv.com
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