Cashback
2006 Directed by Sean Ellis
Synopsis
Sometimes love is hiding between the seconds of your life
A young insomniac attempts to cope with his sleepless nights by taking a job at a local supermarket, only to discover that he possesses a curious coping mechanism in the debut feature from Academy-Award nominated filmmaker Sean Ellis.
Cast
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Ben Willis: "You see, I've always wanted to be a painter, and like many artists before me, the female form has always been a great source of fascination. I've always been in awe of the power they posses."
The really great thing about this film is that it has both teen comedy and true love supplying us with a real life situation, a break up. And a dreamy yet, sophisticated way of coping. A young art student, with a dream of being a famous painter, shows us his perspective of what he loves in his own surreal world of how he portrays life and woman, through true beauty in it's own form.
Ben (Sean Biggerstaff) an art student recently broke…
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March Madness 2013 - No Re-Watch Edition
March Mystery Challenge – Chapeau EditionNOTE: This review contains some minor spoilers later in the text, but they are fairly unspecific.
British indie comedy in which art student Ben (Sean Biggerstaff) goes through a painful break-up (in an uncomfortable but oddly-beautiful silent opening sequence featuring Michelle Ryan screaming obscenities and hate into the camera). Rendered insomniac by his depression, Ben gets a night job at a grocery store. Oh, and he discovers he has the power to freeze time.
The quirky characters he meets resemble Napoleon Dynamite's cast of obnoxious but lovable weirdos. A little bit of these guys goes a long way, for sure, but their antics will definitely make you…
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I'll admit that this review is going to be a little biased… I saw some reviews of this and they seemed to be pretty lukewarm. Depending on where you look, the film has some wildly different receptions. Rotten Tomatoes currently has it around 45%. Here on Letterboxd, the reviews seem to be pretty positive. I went into this with no knowledge of the film and without having read anything on it. This was a good choice because the film really floored me.
Like I said, this is going to be a little biased because I’m currently going through a situation like the main character Ben. No, I can’t stop time…But I am coming off a particularly nasty breakup. I’m not…
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Film #39 of The December Project
I contend that Cashback is a masterpiece.When I joined Letterboxd, I noticed there was a lot of controversy over the ogling of naked women in a grocery store. It's supposed to be a fantasy, so I don't get what the big deal is. He isn't a pervert or a voyeur. He's an art student, searching for the message he wants to send through his work. He settles on championing the female form, which I'm a huge proponent of. All he wants to do is find the beauty in the world and make it accessible for everyone else. Isn't that what art's about?
As for the actual story, it's a great one. It's funny…
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Most of the reviews I read about this film talk about the fact that there's some nudity. That's really not the point of this lovely little gem, though. There's a very gentle aesthetic here, some beautiful cinematic flourishes and a few interesting and original scene fades that convey the sense of time's fluidity.
Cashback deals with themes of love, beauty and the arbitrariness of time's supposed linear progress. There is some soft time travel, but not in the sci-fi sense. It's definitely a fantasy film, with a strong emphasis on romance and a gentle current of comedy, but I wouldn't call it a rom-com.
I'd definitely recommend Cashback. It's quirky, fun, and delightfully British. And there are loads of absolutely smashing tits.
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Film 5 of the Mystery March Challenge
This film brilliantly merges the magical and the mundane to create an almost dreamlike look at life.
Ben is a student recovering from a breakup. This is the catalyst for an entirely different view of life as the resulting insomnia and lack of funds leads him to a job working the night shift at his local supermarket.
Here Ben contemplates love, art and the passing of time. But this is not simply a philosophical study. Also working with Ben are a variety of amusing characters who are very familiar to anyone who has spent a notable amount of time working in the 'customer service industry'.
At times the narration comes close to seeming…
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This is one of the most beautiful and sensitive movies I've ever seen. Sean Ellis is a true artist. I love how he plays with the lights in "Cashback". It's a really good direction.
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Tries to be deep, but falls more towards vapid and sappy. Certainly has a youthful outlook—in the dialogue and vivid sexual content—and is fun at times. That the nudity is largely couched by artistic justifications isn't too off-putting, even if this pretense is completely and utterly dropped by the end.
The time-pausing aspect was what had me watching Cashback in the first place, but it seems unfortunately under-explored, perhaps as a sop to character development.
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Mildly engaging but a focus on style rather than story leaves much to be desired.
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Ever since I was a little boy I dreamt of stopping time. Now this little film utilizes this dream but sadly doesn't use it very much. The main focus lies on life and love and heartbreak in the life of a store-clerk/artist.
In that regard it reminds me very much of "Clerks" (1994) and "High Fidelity" (2000), two of my favourite movies. I see a bunch of parallels, for example where "Clerks" had the hockey game, this has the soccer game and such.
However, the humour here doesn't really click with me and I don't really get why there have to be so much topless women. Not that I don't like a nice rack, it just seemed completely gratuitous to me.
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Ein bisschen abgedreht ist “Cashback” ja schon, aber genau das ist es, was den Film so sehenswert macht. Endlich mal wieder ein Film, der mit einer ungewöhnlichen Idee und einer guten Geschichte überzeugt. Und dann ist der Film auch noch toll besetzt. Sean Biggerstaff (Harry Potter und der Stein der Weisen, Harry Potter und die Kammer des Schreckens) ist zwar nicht gerade ein bekannter Schauspieler, hat aber schon in der gleichnamigen Kurzversion des Film die Rolle von Ben übernommen und war so natürlich mit der Rolle betraut. Wahrscheinlich spielt er diese ungewöhnliche Figur deshalb auch so packend.
Auch Emilia Fox (Der Pianist, Der Tiger und der Schnee) hat bereits im “Cashback”-Kurzfilm die Rolle der Sharon gespielt und wie bei Biggerstaff…
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Ben Willis: "You see, I've always wanted to be a painter, and like many artists before me, the female form has always been a great source of fascination. I've always been in awe of the power they posses."
The really great thing about this film is that it has both teen comedy and true love supplying us with a real life situation, a break up. And a dreamy yet, sophisticated way of coping. A young art student, with a dream of being a famous painter, shows us his perspective of what he loves in his own surreal world of how he portrays life and woman, through true beauty in it's own form.
Ben (Sean Biggerstaff) an art student recently broke…
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I saw this movie quite a while ago, but I still get this "waaaah" feeling thinking about it. I'm really no friend of Love Movies, but this one kind of hit me. It was great in its own way. I'm pretty sure it's no mainstream movie, but I just love it.
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2 stars for the tits
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An absolute fucking delight! Probably one of the best British films of this century. The only reason it doesn't get a higher rating is a rather boring football related sequence in the middle act. It also sets up an entire subplot which is never pursued or explained. The cinematography is beautiful, and the soundtrack really adds to things. It's also impossible to categorise. Yes, it's a romance with comedy, but it isn't a Rom-Com. And yes, it has a sci-fi/fantasy element, but it certainly isn't a sci-fi fantasy. I don't really know what this is, but I like it!