Gearhead (2003) User Reviews

A decent story idea VERY badly executed!

[eamer-v2 · 2/10 · 28 March 2006]

I am very surprised at the success of this film in festivals and other such events. I saw it recently with Joe Magee presenting it to us and to be honest I thought it was a shocking piece of film.

The story isn't a bad idea but the editing and wanting to make it look creative and different ruins the story and takes your mind away from the story and instead you concentrate on how the lead male character is jumping a lot due to the editing. Rather than him walking forward he would literally take two steps forward and one step back. The film overall has nothing about it that stands out and makes you enjoy watching it.

The story for Gearhead was basic and a decent idea but Joe Magee is a guy who seems to not like anything slightly normal. I have saw two of his videos now, this and Hypnomart. Hypnomart is another film which is jumpy, uninteresting and has again bad editing. Magee has tried to do too much and failed miserably as he did with Hypomart as well.

A decent story idea VERY badly executed.

Interesting enough but the jerky editing/animation style makes it feel cheap and amateurish at times

[bob the moo · 20 December 2004]

A young boy leaves his house on a rundown estate and starts hanging around the streets. Spying a woman on a mobile phone he runs up on her, stealing her bag and phone that he then uses to get money and buy drugs. As the day continues he keeps doing all he can to get his score, although the actions run together as he finds himself just living for the next day and the next small-time hustle that will bring him his gear.

As the title suggests, this film is about a drug user who robs and hangs around making just enough money to get high on the same day. The next day he wakes up as he did this day – a bit hung over but quick to get out onto the streets and do it all again. In terms of plot that is as clever as it gets but it still has a rather tragic lure to it that kept me watching. The problem for me was the delivery – I just wasn't won over by all this jumpy editing and jerky playback stuff – it smacked of trying to look fancy when all you have at your disposable is a basic editing suite. The involvement of Aardman may have helped with the strange look to the film (weird colours and elements of animation in the frames) and I did like this aspect but the editing (or whatever it is) should have been dumped because it does make it look cheap.

The story is OK as basic as it is, it still managed to keep me interested and Kirk does a good job of being a wasted druggie Chav without making me angry and annoyed at him – his character was pitiful but not to the point where I felt anger more than pity. Overall this is an OK film but I was a little surprised to see that it has been as successful on the festival circuit as it has been.