Creating both a complexity of visual and verbal suspense, “Another Life” has all the clever elements once seen on the classic “The Twilight Zone” wrapped into a quick twelve-minute package.
Within the walls of a quiet cabin, a couple deals with their personal desires of love and hatred for each other… or at least on the surface. The woman, psychologically torn from the daughter they’ve lost, is a depressing wreak of emotions. The man, much more realistic, attempts to cope with his better half and tries to carry her onto the path of recovery, which reveals a haunting revelation for both.
Director Tracey D’ Arcy truly creates a sense of cinematic creeps by slowly but surely revealing its characters true motivations only a spoonful at a time. Rather than invite us early to the drama, we are eavesdropping into a situation that has been building before the audience even arrived. Both the man (William Sadler) and woman (Jessica Tuck) each pulls off a cryptic performance that never falls to tedium melodramatics so often found in this kind of subject matter.
To discuss the film in further detail would only ruin its mystery, therefore blowing it’s lurking conclusion. For a story that concentrates solely on its two characters’ emotions to keep the plot moving, this short creates a payoff better than what most features try to pull off in two hours.
