"Mona (DC)"

14 May 2024

8 mins 49s

Perspective.

This wondrous piece of contemplative film by director Miles Jay is utterly captivating from first to last. It is a meditation on life, death and everything in between, and it doesn't shirk from a portrayal of every aspect of our existence... Including our non-existence. Only at the end do you entirely recognise the full meaning of the film: that we each possess a unique perspective, as we look at the world from our own point of view.

Miles Jay and his cinematographer Kasper Tuxen use the tropes of documentary to study the lives of a handful of ordinary people in an extraordinary setting. The bleak beauty of Iceland proves a perfect backdrop for this existential examination, and the filmmakers rack up a stunning array of beautiful moments with which to dazzle the viewer.

Every element of the film combines perfectly to demand our attention, including an intriguing music score pieced together by Dirty Soup's Raife Burchell, and featuring original music composed by Aska Matsumiya.

Advertising rarely gets the opportunity to be this languid, and it's even more unusual for it to be anywhere near this profound. While many a claim is made about the artistic merit of the work produced by our industry, the resulting films usually fall short of the hype... not so here, this is a sublimely beautiful short film, and a piece of work that exhibits the tremendous potential of its director.

Germany

Opticians