Chained for Life

Where MASK and ELEPHANT MAN were predictable, feel good movies, this one, like Todd Browning's FREAKS, really gets close to reality. The movie blurs the difference between documentary and fiction in unsettling ways.

I had the extraordinarily good fortune to recently watch Aaron Schimberg's unexpectedly fabulous, darkly mesmerising psychodrama 'Chained for Life' (2018),and it most certainly won't be the last time I return to this ceaselessly dazzling kaleidoscope of bravura fascinating originality! 'Chained for Life' boasts a really lovely, ornate, sparklingly original premise, a richly woven text, withering pathos, wonderfully sardonic performances, and a deliciously irreverent tone that make this devilishly clever oddity a sensationally convention-boggling delight from its enigmatic start to breathlessly brilliant finish! For me, maestro Schimberg's emotionally edifying, tantalizingly transgressive 'Chained for Life' is one of those all-too rare, blissfully unclassifiable films that one should ideally go into totally blind; keeping dem voyeuristic peepers open once the movie starts, natch!!!! But I just have to say, the Werner Herzog-sounding director was a genuinely exquisite touch! The multi-faceted, persistently perspicacious phantasmagoria 'Chained for Life' is bound to beguile any innately curious, sensation-seeking fan of exquisitely wrought,insightfully humane, refreshingly cliche free cinematic wonder!

This must have been an immensely enjoyable film to make, once they'd worked out what piece of cinema or film they were actually trying to conjure - a little bit all over the place, to say the least, but as original a proposition as you've likely encountered for some time - with the main premise established on cultural prejudice and discrimination to difference. It uses those who lack the symmetry of societal expectations of beauty, by several standard deviations in this case, to reaffirm that differences are only skin deep but those physical attributes are shackled to the individuals psychology, as well as societal norms, whose end result is to imprison them without bars for most, if not all of their lives - akin to living in an open prison or asylum for a crime or crimes you didn't commit.

Besides the tremendous performance from Jess Weixler this film is absolutely atrocious. It was all over the place and made no sense whatsoever. I was completely lost and had no idea what was going on the entire film. I still don't know what the hell I just watched. Would not recommend.

Don't know much about film production. However, this one was quite hard to differentiate between reality, documentary and real acting. Was about to skip it. Insanely brilliant!