Is it very low budget? Does filmmaker Weiping Kaigen intend art film pretensions? Is this a student film that has been belatedly completed? Is it a deadpan parody of one or more of these varieties? Such tacks are what one may assume given such qualities as an image from which color has been considerably washed out; significant gratuitous nudity; and dialogue (voiceover narration) that ranges from aloof to abstruse where it presents, sometimes almost poetic and sometimes just strange, and always overemphasized in the audio mix. (Why, the sound design is deeply imbalanced generally.) We get sparing music with what often seems to bear little rhyme or reason; no few shots or scenes simply of landscapes, mundane nothings, or just Biding Time; a performance from star and sole credited performer Sophie Reinhart that's mostly just casually disaffected, and delivery that's all over the place and sometimes downright perplexing. While ambient sounds are included in the soundtrack, and any non-linguistic utterances such as sighs, or moans of pleasures, even what we hear of phone conversations are expressed only through voiceovers added in post-production. The very premise, wherever one may read it, comes across as loose and almost noncommittal, and as the length advances, it doesn't seem like 'Velvet' has any particularly greater substance to it beyond even that.
What is this movie?
Much has been made of the laughably unimaginative and amateurish similes, metaphors, and otherwise descriptors employed by male authors when attempting to depict, in written word, the female form and female sexuality. A fair bit of the dialogue and indeed the scene writing in this feature is characterized by the same bewildering propensity, and not just where sexuality, nudity, or physicality is concerned. So, so very much of Kaigen's writing and direction is completely flummoxing. At some points it feels like 'Velvet' actually is an earnest effort at some intersection of low budget, art film, or student film, while at others the presentation is so outrageous in word or image that there's no way it can possibly be anything other than a comedy. Why, the scene to greet us shortly after the halfway mark - you'll know the one when you see it - is so astoundingly overcooked that I laughed harder than I have in a fair while. At no time during these sixty minutes is there ever a moment where the picture is molded into some definite shape, or stitched with a meaningfully consistent through-line, such that I feel like I (or anyone) could possibly get a real grasp on what the filmmaker was trying to do.
I repeat: What is this movie?
It may seem like an exaggeration, yet while it's no reflection of quality, this is so utterly baffling that the only comparison to readily come to mind is Tommy Wiseau's infamous magnum opus, 'The room.' Even that may not be entirely fair, though, as Wiseau's intention was at least clear, even if all the choices made along the way were not. Here, not only are Kaigen's decisions of "storytelling" and film-making indiscernible, but I really just don't know what it is he hoped for this project to be. 'Velvet' is one astonishingly mystifying shot, incomprehensible scene, unfathomable line after another. And even still: I'm not inclined to think that any of this was accidental, or a mishap. Ever does the puzzle grow.
I don't know who I would recommend this to. I don't know how to begin to form cohesive explanatory language about what I've just witnessed. Maybe there's someone out there (apart from Kaigen, or presumably Reinhart) who can understand what has happened, how this came into being, what it was all for. I'm certainly not that person, however, and I surely don't know who is. Should I like it because it made me laugh, and piqued my interest for the sheer discombobulating effect of the presentation? Should I loathe it on account of the enigmatic incoherence? I'm at a loss. If you find yourself watching 'Velvet,' please share your thoughts somewhere public so that maybe, just maybe, those of us who have viewed it can collectively discover some hidden reasoning. Good luck, and good night.
