My review of Brand New-U

Why come on to a review site and leave a link of your review on another review site!?? Jus post yha review on here to! Copy & paste, nothing hard is it! You want people to read you're review then post that, not some blag to another spam site for all I know? & that's not a lot thanks to stupid fake Review's like yours! Jus wanted to know whether film is any good!? Guess ile wait for a decent person to post there opinions....

I helped you out by quoting your review and pasting it here. " "


Premiering at the Edinburgh International Film Festival Brand New-U is an impressive looking sci-fi thriller, made on a budget of €1.3 Million, but suffers from a story and themes that would have been better served in a short film.

Slater (Lachlan Nieboer) and Nadia (Nora-Jane Noone) are a young couple seemingly in love. But Nadia is taken by a masked man and Slater end ups being the prime suspect for her murder. With no options Slater goes to the company Brand New-U who offers him a way out, allowing him to start a new life and let someone else take the fall. In a new city Slater finds a woman like Nadia which puts both of them in danger.

Brand New-U‘s first act is where the film shines brightest. Pummell sets out an intriguing premise and near-future world, a world where people can restart life, has cloning and constant surveillance. Pummell shows his influences in the first third, the story of restarting life could easily have worked as a Black Mirror story and the look of the headquarters of Brand New-U has a sterile, white ascetic with corporate videos constantly playing gives the film a Black Mirror-style look. Blade Runner was also an influence with characters being questioned like Deckard did with Rachael, asking very specific questions to get certain answers.

Love and destiny are other themes that play a major role in the film. Despite Slater and Nadia meaning to start new lives and have a blank slate they continue to be drawn to each other despite the dangers that they face: a theme that has been explored in sci-fi films like Dark City and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. But the theme would have been stronger if the characters could not recognise each other and still want to be together.

Slater’s apartment in the city after starting his life has a slight dystopia feel to it. It is a minimalistic look and his TV continues to have a corporate messages. He is constantly being watched, a more overt version of the surveillance work. It’s hard not to think of similar sets in 1984, THX-1138 and Equilibrium as well as a social commentary about Britain’s surveillance culture, where people are constantly being watched. This even happens before the characters star their new lives with them being watched on CCTV wherever they go.

Though Brand New-U was conceptually interesting with nuggets of good ideas it’s the execution where the film falters – both in direction and writing. As the film progresses into its dystopia setting, plot holes start to arise like why is Slater sent to the same city? How come Nadia does not recognise Slater? Why did Nadia want to restart her life in the first place? When the third act comes around Brand New-U just turns into a glorified student film, both visually and story-wise, attempting to be arty for the sake of being arty.

Due to the budget being €1.3 Million the obvious CGI cityscapes are forgiveable and it is admirable that Pummell wanted to show a large scale world. But some of the set do look very cheap and inconsistent. There is a white spiral staircase which looks like it was filmed in a corporate building and scales down the world of the dystopia city. Pummell uses red and white lights as a mask to her hide the clear art-direction, especially at the end. The use of long takes however were virtue for the film.

The leads do a decent job with their roles. Nora-Jane Noone was the stronger of the two, being more recognisable due her roles in The Magdalene Sisters and The Descent. She was more natural in her role then Nieboer as a performer and in her half of the relationship.

Brand New-U had a great premise for a sci-fi romance thriller because of its themes: but suffers from its weak story. It was a screenplay that needed to be refined before production started to solve its plot holes. Ideas that could have been used are looking at sci-fi witness protection or characters having their memories erased and still being drawn together.

Your review was too kind, freemantle. Everyone involved in this abomination should get banned from the film industry for 10 years to have a good long hard think about what a pile of junk they produced.

I never say or believe in this thing about "I want my 1.5 hours of life back for watching junk" but I feel that way now!

I agree with your comparison to "Black Mirror"....and that is the likely the top reason I wanted to love this movie so much....I LOVE "Black Mirror".

But this failed to resolve questions/portions of the plot that were integral to understanding the storyline itself and thus, I was left frustrated.