Writer/director Alvin Case’s Sun Opener drops us into a drifting drummer’s surreal second chance at life. The film is about a road trip that’s less about the miles that pass and more about the strange gravitational force that pulls two mismatched travelers out of their ruts.
After years of sobriety and feeling as if he’s been living slightly out of phase with reality, Bobby (Gordon Ramsey), an unemployed drummer, drifts through his days until a lost pair of light-therapy glasses triggers a strange, disorienting high of sorts. As he comes down from the experience, almost by fate, he gets a call from a club manager in Salt Lake City who needs a last-minute house drummer. Bobby hasn’t played in twelve years, but it’s money and opportunity. To make the gig, he has to retrieve his drum kit from a friend, a somewhat complicated task, as he’ll get the drums only under the condition that he drives a young troublemaker named Alice (Adeline Schneider) along with him.
Bobby reluctantly agrees to take Alice, grabs his gear, and immediately hands her off to another friend before the long drive. Before they arrive, the pair takes a detour to the beach, where they bond, and she insists on joining him for the trip to Utah. While on a breezy walk, Alice presses him about his past and the drumming dream he walked away from over a decade ago. In an existential mood, Bobby says he feels like he’s running out of time—not in a literal sense, but in an ethereal way, as sobriety has made him aware of every passing moment.
“…a drifting drummer’s surreal second chance at life…”
Sun Opener runs 40 minutes and falls right into the WTF category we love so much at Film Threat. It’s narrated from Bobby’s perspective. Shot on film, the story plays out like The Beatles’ Hard Day’s Night or an episode of the Monkees. Our perspective is that of a distant third person, as our duo wanders through life to a jammin’ rock soundtrack. It’s definitely not about the destination but the journey.
Case explains that Sun Opener was born of a scrappy 2012 road-trip shoot, where his life became an improvised comedy with two stand-ups—an idea that collapsed when one comic refused to skip his neighborhood softball game, forcing Case to rebuild the film on the fly. He describes spending six days and 3,000 miles filming with a tiny crew, non-seasoned actors, and no real safety net, then spending years shaping the footage like a documentary until the story finally emerged. Case says that the turning point came when he heard “Because I Am Haunted” by (The Sounds Of) Kaleidoscope, a track that unified the tone of the early cut and inspired the final voiceover that reframed the narrative. Case says the themes grew naturally from the material: a nonsense-leaning road story with a beating heart underneath, anchored in improvisation, creative abandon, and the feeling of searching for direction when life has cracked open into something strange and uncertain.
Alvin Case’s unconventional filmmaking style brings a great deal of charm to Sun Opener. Here, two generations — Alice and Bobby, the older being a hemp-inspired oracle of sorts — are coming together to learn and inspire one another on an open-air road trip. Makes me want to drop everything and drive.
For more information, visit the Sun Opener official website.
"…Case's unconventional filmmaking style brings a great deal of charm..."
