johannes2000-1
This movie of director Monty Miranda is actually surprisingly good. It's "small" on every account: no complicated special effects, no elaborate settings, just a few characters. But it still manages to let you sit on the edge of your chair for the whole movie, trying to find out, together with the main character, what the hell happened and why. The premise is simple but original and very effective. John is a young guy who seems to have it all: moving into the attractive house left to him by his beloved, recently deceased father, a beautiful girlfriend, a promotion on his job. But then he is confronted with the theft of his classic car and one day later the apparently pointless ransacking of his house. While the police doesn't seem to do very much, the guy spends sleepless nights pondering over the question who could be the culprits, eventually getting totally worn-out and delusional by lack of sleep and suspicious of every person in his vicinity, up to his best friends, his fiancée, the neighbours teenage son and even the most important client of his office. We witness his gradual downfall into paranoia and at last into violence.The script is intelligent, all the way through we side-up with John, even in his paranoia, because his frustration is so understandable. This is greatly helped by the casting of Eddy Salazar as John, who is perfect in both parts of his character: first as the young, slick, self-confident and slightly conceited yup, later as the totally frustrated paranoid who more and more loses his wits. It seems that Salazar co-wrote the screenplay, so kudos for that! There is no happy ending (yet another positive token of not following the easy paths of the genre) but there actually is provided for a solution of the mystery, so you end-up with the feeling that it wasn't all for nothing.The girlfriend is played by Clare Grant who does a fine job too. The other parts are only small, albeit that we see old regulars as Danny Trejo and John Heard pass by. I like to give a special mention to Keith Szarabajka as the overbearing, prying and actually very funny neighbor and to Brett Delbuono as his son Tommy, who convincingly plays his small part of the indignant wrongly accused teenager. In short, a very fine and original small movie, very worthwhile.
OJT
The Insomniac is a very entertaining movie mystery about the young man John Figg (flawlessly played by Eddie Salazar) who has everything until he loses his father in a massive heart attack. But having been very smart and effective, he gets a nice promotion, followed with great confidence by his boss (John Heard). His girlfriend and him are moving into a luxurious house in a new suburban neighborhood, but then one morning going to job his classic car, inherited from his father is missing, with a cheeky post-it note left. After work he comes home finding his house robbed and his fathers ashes thrown around in the living room, once again with a note.This is how The Insomniac by director Monty Miranda starts off, and the title tells us what happens next. John Figg are not able to sleep, and the sleep deprivation slowly makes him lose grip, and he starts suspecting almost everyone is untrustworthy. Even his clients, like the rich Jairo Torres (Danny Trejo), which he out of nowhere accuses of doing the break in. The film gave me a nice throwback to one of those nice crazy thrillers with insane plots we saw so many of in the 80'ies. i found the film immensely entertaining, and with a plot you simply don't know where's going. A film which both seems familiar and then has an insane plot, is just what i was looking for today. The film also makes you guessing to the end. What a blast!
