A Beautiful Distraction, co-directed by Marcus Slabine and Deborah Twiss, from a script by Twiss, explores a world after a cataclysmic event that doesn’t look much different from ours. In 2012, there was a profound change in the world, essentially ending life as we know it, but most people didn’t even notice. Some are evolving in the new timeline, while others are losing their minds. Cosmic intelligences are stepping in to help the capable humans evolve.
Abigail (Twiss) and Richard (Anthony Grasso) are going through a rough patch in their marriage when she meets a mysterious, handsome stranger named Michael (Adrian Paul) in New York. Richard is drinking to excess, and Abigail’s children feel she’s unsafe with him.
Strange coincidences begin stacking up for her, and Michael tells her that there are no accidents and that they’ve met for a purpose. She begins having dreams of sex with Michael, along with flashes of images of herself in Grand Central Station. She bumps into Michael again at an art event hosted by her friend Claire (Vivica A. Fox). Claire’s friend Brigid (Sean Young) floats around the art show performance tableaus, speaking and acting as a disconnected, breezy presence.
Abigail can’t brush off the influence of Michael as random chance when he appears in her office. She is confused and thinks he’s stalking her. This is all happening as the city is plagued by a serial killer who beheads victims. Everyone is on edge. When Michael talks to her, he exhorts her to discover her true self, speaking in vague, lofty pronouncements. He insists that she’s forgotten who she is. Is Michael crazy? Is Abigail? She must discover the truth behind this intriguing stranger, and her bizarre dreams of him. Who, or what, is Michael?
“… Cosmic intelligences are stepping in to help the capable humans evolve …”
A Beautiful Distraction takes a run at being high concept on a low budget, and succeeds moderately. The concept, however, is dense and confusing, muddled in cryptic dreams and synchronicity. There’s too much going on, and not enough focus on the core idea. At some point, the audience should be let in on the secret. This effort might work better as an episodic series so that each thread could be explored. All that aside, there is real pleasure in the performances, which are engaging across the board, even if it is difficult to get what Twiss is driving at.
The usual fare from Breaking Glass Pictures doesn’t include actors with name recognition, but Twiss has scored appearances from long-time, albeit faded, stars from the past. It’s a pleasant surprise to see Vivica A. Fox (Independence Day), Sean Young (Blade Runner), and Adrian Paul (1992 Highlander: The Series). Fox and Paul deliver their roles with polish and grace, and Young does, well, what Young does these days. She should have had a killer career after No Way Out and Blade Runner, but she was labeled as “difficult,” and all those moments were, indeed, lost in time like tears in rain.
In a fascinating echo from The Highlander, Paul delivers a similar opening monologue to the initial narration by Sean Connery in the old film: “From the dawn of time we came; moving silently down through the centuries, living many secret lives … no one has ever known we were among you… until now.”
Breaking Glass Pictures specializes in genre films, usually low- to no-budget, and distributes them globally. They provide a friendly home base for Indie filmmakers getting started, or those working with few resources, and have distributed over 500 films. They have made their place in the world of cinema as “passionate advocates for the independent filmmaking community.” What these films, like A Beautiful Distraction, lack in polish and expensive production quality, they make up for in ambition and vision.
Twiss and Slabine have created a beautiful artifact in A Beautiful Distraction, but one which falls short of the mark as a thriller / metaphysical mystery. Those shortcomings are more than forgiven by moments between characters that have real emotional impact.
Learn more at the official A Beautiful Distraction website.
"…There are moments between characters that have real emotional impact"
