Release Date – TBC, Cert – N/A, Run-time – 1 hour 37 minutes, Director – Kristoffer Borgli
Competing with her boyfriend’s (Eirik Sæther) rise in fame, Signe (Kristine Kujath Thorp) does everything she can to regain attention through whatever medical means necessary.
Sick Of Myself not only brings attention seeking to a new artform but to an entirely new level of competitiveness. There’s a fiery need for attention within Signe (Kristine Kujath Thorp) already at the start of the film, however it soon clashes with her boyfriend Thomas’s (Eirik Sæther) increasing rise in the art world with his contemporary sculptures. Thus, the two find themselves in a battle for the love and admiration of their friends, and to some extent beyond. While one remains largely career based the other turns to the medical world, after all we feel, fear and worry for those in pain, don’t we?
Thus Signe turns herself to face more than just a few broken bones – after all she needs more than “56 text messages and a few visits and that’s it” if she’s going to truly feel noticed. There’s a brilliant central performance from Kujath Thorp who knows exactly when to remove the tinge of playfulness as her character begins to spiral further and further into a world of literal pain and risk which raise concern for where she might end up – both mentally and physically. This particularly being the case when some instances – especially one involving a table and a face – are more effective than a number of horror films in getting a response.
Yet, for all such moments and the humour the film creates there’s plenty of interest within the narrative in seeing the cracks begin to come through in Signe’s presentations, and indeed to some extent Thomas’. This especially being the case in the final half hour where the interest and engagement from the viewer carries things through as a lot is packed into this short space of time now the competing and escalating is somewhat out the way. Certainly the competing makes for a number of highlights. There’s plenty of enjoyment to be found within such moments through just how far the central figure goes for attention. Even the escalating packs a good deal of humour in, although perhaps not quite standing as strong as the more back-and-forth style and the cynical, ungrateful responses from Signe in regards to what comes back to her.
Yet, there’s still enough to be found within that final half hour, which still works well, to keep things moving along and stop them from feeling overlong as well (the film managing to come in at just 97 minutes overall). Particularly helped by the fact that you never quite know just where it will go, or just how high the bar will be raised, adding to the humour and anticipation which lies throughout. Not just raising the bar of competitive attention seeking, but taking it into a new competition entirely of its own.
While it might have a lot to get in the final half hour it’s largely because the back-and-forth attention seeking competition led by an excellent Kristine Kujath Thorp is the effectively funny initial focus of much of Sick Of Myself, creating plenty of interest and engagement along the way.
Just A Little Bit Random 