Video Vision

What initially seems like a lightweight story, about a young woman who works in a video repair shop and embarks on a new relationship, takes on additional dimensions in this Frightfest 2024 contribution from Michael Turney. It’s an exploration of the relationship between technology and social change, which combines a fond nostalgia for VHS with an appreciation of the possibilities offered by the future.

Kibby (Andrea Figliomeni) is the sole employee of a small business, working alongside her boss Rodney (Shelley Valfer) on a variety of tasks related to archaic video technology. When Rodney is called in for jury duty, she is left alone to deal with a box of old tapes, and something strange gets on her hand when she’s working with them. From then on, exactly what’s happening becomes uncertain. Was the unknown substance some kind of slow-acting hallucinogen? Is it having a material effect on her body? Is she going through an unrelated mental illness? For the most part, Turney keeps the symptoms low key, more interested in what they signify than in ramping up any sense of horror. The result sometimes lacks energy, but it does play well into those wider themes.

During the early stages of this experience, Kibby is also kept busy transferring some VHS tapes to digital for a new customer, Gator (Chrystal Peterson). He’s trans, which is something she’s unfamiliar with at a personal level, and she’s surprised to find herself attracted to him. Their developing relationship provides an additional angle on change and body horror. It’s rather heavy on the trans 101 stuff – possibly useful for some viewers, but likely to bore others – but this, in turn, provides a route into some more unusual conversations and gifts Gator the fantastic line “I’ve accepted the fact that I’m male. Maybe you should accept the fact that you’re turning into an obsolete entertainment device.”

When the film isn’t being didactic, there’s some good dialogue here, with the relationship between Kibby and Rodney particularly well drawn and providing welcome humour. The film sometimes struggles to balance its serious ideas with its sense of mischief, which harks back to an age of straight-to-VHS genre silliness, but that comes bursting through in places, with some Tron-style graphics close to the end and a twee closing song that is spot on. There’s some nice work cutting between the visual textures of VHS and ‘reality’, and, of course, there are the obligatory Videodrome references. One cannot but think of Brian O’Blivion when watching this film’s Dr Analog, even if he never achieves the same depth or sense of portent.

With the shift in perspective brought about by the Covid pandemic also factoring into the story, Video Vision has no shortage of ideas to play with. Its weakness lies in the fact that it never really goes very deep, and as a result it struggles to stand up alongside similar works. Some of this is just bad luck. Its videotape bondage scenes, for instance, would make a lot more impact had it not appeared hot on the heels of Tiago Teixera’s sublime Custom. Its romance is also a little short on chemistry – believable enough early on, when the couple are just getting to know each other, but problematic later on. That said, there’s a lot to like here, especially for those who still feel more excited about film when it comes in a brick-sized package they can hug.