The Door

     RATING (out of 5)

    
A film review by Mark Athitakis - Copyright
    © 2006 filmcritic.com

    
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    Bruce Wood’s debut full-length feature is an appealing,
    if somewhat clunky, high-concept psychological thriller. Kent
    (Bill Ferris) is despairing about his life after the end of a
    long relationship; to perk his spirits, his friend Ori (Ryan
    Martin) decides to introduce him to three friends of his, who
    happen to be not only lucid dreamers but actually share the same
    dreams. Kent, who’s never dreamed himself, is skeptical
    about this whole “dream” business — he’s
    skeptical about pretty much everything around Ori, actually —
    but he slowly becomes immersed in the lives of all three.

    
As thrillers go, The Door takes a while
    to get to the “thriller” part — Wood spends the
    first third of film establishing the backgrounds of the three
    dreamers: Jean (Katherine Wray), who’s desperate to escape
    a bad marriage; Ron (Chase Stoeger), an anxious fund manager;
    and Charlene (Karla Magnan), a recently minted doctor hunting
    for a job. It doesn’t help that Wood clutters the early
    scenes with a host of family members, friends, and other assorted
    characters who don’t contribute much to the plot. But once
    Kent meets all three, Wood’s script starts firing on all
    cylinders. Kent is something of a miracle worker for each of
    his new friends, helping each of them to start achieving their
    biggest (yup) dreams. Yet as Kent’s intentions get called
    into question and Ori emerges as increasingly sinister, svengali-like
    man, the film becomes an entertainingly dark meditation on how
    swallowed up we can be by our ambitions.

    
Wood has a background in fine arts and
    avant-garde filmmaking — he’s worked as a painter and
    studied filmmaking with Stan Brakhage — and he brings a
    bit of an abstract sensibility to The Door. Dream sequences use
    rich double exposures, process shots, and color filters that
    give those moments and appropriately disorienting feel. (And
    the mood’s neatly underscored by an energetic experimental
    jazz score.) The performances are sometimes stiff, as if the
    actors haven’t quite internalized the layers of thinking
    about sex, fear, love, money, and more that Wood’s crammed
    into this story. But given the complexity of the story, The Door
    is surprisingly cohesive and engaging.

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Director: Bruce Wood
Producer: Bruce Wood
Screenwriter: Bruce Wood
Stars: Bill Ferris, Ryan Martin, Katherine Wray, 
Chase Stoeger, Karla Magnan
MPAA Rating: NR
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Year of Release: 2005
Released on Video: 07/04/2006