SUPER DARK TIMES (2017)

6/1/18 - Super Dark Times (2017) - 7-/10

A genuinely affecting teen drama/suspense. It was craftily framed and shot, with a dark saturation and linger on the showdown interstitial bits of life and death. It felt fitting in the lightly nostalgia sprinkled teen legitimacy. There is a push pull of emotions and hormones, taught life definition and almost nonsensical adolescent quirkiness/dressing/decoration. The visceral incapacitation of the guilt and the flippancy of teenagedome just rang true.

True to its title, it is so very dark, forlorn, and haunted. It uses the adrenaline of murderous suspense and budding teen romance to keep it the pace progressive and properly ramping up. There is an inevitability in all areas and a grimness that scars all involved, but enough intrigue and fascination to make us want to step again into its emotional punji pit.

The final end is so profoundly bittersweet. The revelations that directly proceed it may have felt acutely embellished and out of character, but the inescapable destruction they wrought let me digest the logical eccentricities.

I was swept up in this dreamy walk down a teenage memory lane that, thankfully, wasn’t my own, but that I could still recognize. Believably acted and consciously directed to capture a sorrow and hopefulness within its entirety, which is a fitting analogy to my remembrances on pubescence.