Archive for November, 2009

Reflecting a social networking-saturated youth culture where YouTube speaks directly to millions of kids, OMG/Hahaha offers a deeper, digitally filtered view into a seemingly superficial psyches of the MySpace generation. Edgy and intimate in the tradition of cutting edge film making inspired by Gus van Sant and Greg Araki, Morgan Jon Fox’s (Blue Citrus Hearts) film weaves a simple narrative together via part video blog, part improvisational narrative, and part pseudo documentary.  Omg/Hahaha is a pastiche of the lives of a diverse set of gay, straight and trans teens living in Memphis, TN.  One teen’s video blog frames the various stories and troubles from breakups, dying parents, unexpected pregnancy to homophobia.

A unique idea for a movie sucks you in (so to speak) from the very beginning and makes you feel like you’re watching, not a movie but a documentary or a MySpace vlog.  In fact, that was the very idea of director Morgan Jon Fox.  Some was scripted, most was improv, and together it makes for a pretty good film.  I think the younger generation would prefer this more than the ‘older’ folks, and I say ‘older’ with the utmost respect.  OMG/HaHaHa has a lot of internet lingo (like the title) written on screen as a running narrative throughout the picture (there is no narrator, per se, but rather a series of text message-like notes in place of where a narrator should be).  So if you’re not up to snuff with your internet dictionary, you may miss the point of a lot of scenes. What I found most fascinating was how comfortable these gay and transgendered teens were with themselves, and others, and their being out of the closet -- especially in a Southern US city.  As it’s quite apparent that the "actors" are really gay, if they aren’t out yet -- they will be outed by this film, that’s for sure (your gaydar will be going off). Check out the deleted scenes, as well.  Those are pretty good. [Review from azovfilms]

0