VOD Review - Prescience

The feature debut from James Helsing, alternately titled Intuitions, is very ambitious. His film, which he co-wrote with some of the actor-producers, takes on a lot, probably too much. It wouldn't be too much, if the film devoted more time to everything. 90 minutes doesn't feel like enough time to deal properly with everything that is on the plate in this film. An extra 30 minutes would have been better, but another 10 or 15 minutes at least should have been added. The film feels rushed. It jumps from one traumatic thing to another very dramatic thing to another very traumatic thing too quickly. It all goes by so fast that it doesn't feel like we have time to absorb anything and really delve into it, so that it has an impact. The film goes from child molestation, to rape, to homophobia, to domestic abuse, to xenophobia, to drug cartels, to immigration, to adultery and to possible murder. There's actually enough here for Helsing, if he wanted to do a film trilogy. That's if he did three properly paced films, not the rush job with which this film was done.

René Mena is a co-writer of the film. Mena also stars as Isaac Smith, a Latino lawyer living in Los Angeles who is trying to get a job at a law firm, any firm actually. He lives with his sister in the family home of their adopted parents who are white. He has a girlfriend, a beautiful redhead. Without a job and his sister's work not being lucrative, they decide to get another roommate to help pay the bills. However, while all this happens, Isaac is having weird dreams. Some of which are nightmares about things in his past and present. When the roommate arrives, Isaac's feelings about his life start to change.

Specifically, his feelings regarding his sexuality start to change. He has a girlfriend, so Isaac is seemingly straight, but now, he's developed an attraction toward his new, male roommate, which suggests that he's gay. The title of this movie is a word that means having knowledge of something before it happens. This is exactly how you could describe Isaac's friends. Somehow, they knew that Isaac was gay before him having these feelings for this new guy. The reason that I say this film was rushed is because the film has his friends say they knew he was gay before he said anything, but they never explain why or how they knew.

Lashawn Williams (pictured above) is another co-writer of the film. He co-stars as James, the best friend to Isaac and an aspiring musician. He spends most of his time in a recording studio. He's the one though who says he knew ever since high school that Isaac was gay. He says he got a vibe, but a film that wasn't in a rush would have elucidated that point. James and Isaac are supposed to be best friends. Yet, James and Isaac only have two scenes together in the whole movie, one at the beginning and one toward the end. A film that wasn't in a rush would have given the two friends more scenes together in order to explain how and why James thought Isaac was gay.

There's also a hint about an incident, a physical altercation where James saved Isaac. Yet, we never get any more details about it. A film that wasn't in a rush would have given us those details in order to establish what happened between James and Isaac. Unfortunately, the film has to rush through a half-dozen or more other issues, leaving the seemingly central issue about Isaac's sexuality in the dust.

Mike C. Manning (Youthful Daze and MTV's The Real World) also co-stars as Mark, the aforementioned, new roommate who comes to live with Isaac and his sister. He's from Virginia and happened to attend the same university that Isaac attended. Having both went to VCU, this helps Mark and Isaac to bond. They're clearly smitten with each other, but they don't know that each other is gay until both run into each other at a gay bar. At first, Mark wants to be Isaac's wingman and help him. Mark clearly has more experience with being gay than Isaac. He wants to help Isaac, but he's not the one to make the first move when it comes to him hooking up with Isaac.

Again, because this film is so rushed, there is no time to breath in terms of Isaac and Mark being  a couple. There's a brief montage of them as a couple, but it's not clear how much time has passed. Right away, Mark is meeting Isaac's parents who aren't surprised or have an issue with their adopted son being gay. However, it's at Mark's first meeting of his parents during a dinner that all these secrets start coming out. From that point, it's one revelation after another and one twist after another, which all becomes too much. It would be enough for a film if it had one revelation and one twist, but to have one after the other with not much space to breathe in between makes the film too much of a mess.

Helsing does make some interesting directing choices. His movement of the camera in and out of certain scenes are clever here and there. The scene inside the recording studio was probably one of the best acted moments in the film. Visually, the scene where Isaac and Mark talk to each other in a veritable black box was an interesting idea. The writing of it was very much akin to Brokeback Mountain (2005), so it felt a little regressive. Like Brokeback Mountain, this film comes down to the idea of a married man who is a closeted gay man unable to be himself, but the film seemingly draws the line between whether he's gay or straight. It would have been a great opportunity if the film embraced bisexuality. Manning is openly bisexual in real life, but the film acts as if bisexuality isn't a thing or sexual fluidity isn't a thing.

Not Rated but contains language, nudity and intense sexuality.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 30 mins.

Available on DVD and VOD.