directed by:
Wes B. Clark written by: Wes B. Clark genre: Thriller |
At some point in your life, the phone is going to ring, and the news is not going to be good. When Kara (Alice Reys) gets that call, she’s deep in her work at the office trying to get caught up. Informed that her mother has unfortunately passed on, that’s where the story of “Mirror” begins. The family tragedy becomes the catalyst for how Kara reunites with her sister Zara (also played by Alice Reys), which brings up a whole bunch of past trauma from the history they’ve shared.
This gets COMPLICATED, and very quickly. It’s also hard to get around a few spoilers in discussing this film, so be prepared for that. “Mirror” dives into the past to share the origin story of the two twin sisters, which provides you with a ton of insight into why they’ve become estranged in their relationship as adults. I’m gonna end up sounding like I’m spreading the gossip here, but it is what it is. As it turns out, Kara and Zara have two completely different fathers, which was a secret that had been successfully kept for years before a trip to the hospital at a young age forced Dr. Bishop (Bre Conte) to reveal the information out loud. The news is not exactly welcome, to say the least…ultimately it ends up being the root of what rips their family apart. Kara sticks around and ends up in the role of the daughter who feels the weight of responsibility, and Zara decides to leave to try to live her own life without having to worry so much about her family & their past. Some of these flashbacks are seriously intense, like where you’ll see their mother in decline and lashing out at Kara in ways a parent never should. It’s tough stuff to reconcile…you know that it’s not really Mom’s fault, but at the same time, who else can you hold responsible? As Kara will explain, the issues with her mother started long before she got here, tracing back to her own childhood, where she met with the ultimate betrayal of abuse in her early years. Mother Tara (Alexis Calderon) then turns to alcohol as the solution, and of course the spiral of personal chaos doesn’t tend to get better when that’s the case for anybody. It’s fair to say that Tara never recovered from what she went through, which is fully understandable considering the circumstances. What makes it even harder on the viewing side of the screen is watching this story play out - not only is it tough to watch the way it has affected her life, but it basically took away her ability to be an effective mom to her kids, which might very well be the biggest tragedy of them all. I know what you’re thinking – some folks shouldn’t be parents, and I get that. By the same token, I think it’s also on us all to have a little grace in knowing that life doesn’t always go the way we think that it will. Believe me when I tell you, “Mirror” is far from done by presenting its complexities in relationships to you at this point in the film…in fact, you could make the argument that it’s really still just getting started. From my perspective, Wes B. Clark has got himself a solid family drama here. I like the shots he chooses, the lenses he’s shooting with to capture such clarity, and, in general, I dig how he’s decided to show us this story. When you hit the twist in the middle of the movie, it is DEVASTATING. Like, it’s SO BIG that you couldn’t possibly miss it, but at the same time you have to shake your head and wonder if it really is what you’re thinking it is…or maybe we just end up hoping that it could be literally ANYTHING else. I think as viewers, there’s really no doubt about what happens, but yeah, even I felt like I was hoping I blinked at the wrong time, or I missed some crucial detail that would make this heinous act of betrayal between family be something different than what it was. It’s hard to imagine how your own sister could stab you in the back in this kind of way, but it’s certainly possible by all accounts. Wes did an excellent job of finding a way to add some real fringe situations into “Mirror” without anything becoming unbelievable. From the rare medical occurrence that gives birth to the sisters to the main twist in their story, we have to acknowledge that these scenarios would be totally rare but still totally possible, which ultimately helps keep our suspension of disbelief in check. He also gets an absolutely stellar performance…err, two performances, out of Alice Reys, who you really end up seeing as two completely different people and personalities in her roles as sisters Kara and Zara. Credit where credit is due – she does an exceptional job playing the buttoned-down version as Kara, but she might do an even better job in slipping into the fiery personality of Zara. The real bottom line is, you could never really confuse one with the other by the way that she plays her characters, which is also what makes the main twist in this tale as effective as it is as well.
The camera work is all solid – Clark has a good eye for quality. It’s not a demanding movie in that regard, being a family-based drama & all, but it’s not like he skimped on anything he should have; he simply gave this story what it needed, and that’s the right way to go about filmmaking, in my opinion. If you don’t need a bunch of crazy effects - don’t use them! Clark made the right calls as the captain of this ship from how he chose to lay this story out, to the twists and turns he co-wrote with Devon Smith, to finding a small but powerful cast that could bring the vision for this story to life onscreen. What I think folks might find to be even more impressive is how many twists there really are. From the past to the present, they keep on coming, and even when you think you have reached the last one, there are still more to follow. In that regard, you’ll see the evolution of Kara as the lines begin to blur, and “Mirror” becomes much more of a commentary on what matters most when it comes to our happiness. By the time that Kara’s boyfriend Nick (Kevin Renalto) asks her to marry him, the layers of complexity to that moment are genuinely staggering. Like, your head should pretty much explode in trying to process it. Obviously I’m trying to avoid spoiling some major details of the plotline, but truly, it should blow your mind just trying to consider how all these pieces of the puzzle fit together, or indeed how their lives could continue from this point forward without everything falling apart even more than it has so far. And yet, the twists keep on coming! With about ten minutes left on the clock, you’ll find another HUGE shocker, which can’t help but change the future. As that scene plays out in full between flashbacks, it takes an incredibly devious turn, flipping the whole script and turning this drama into a real thriller. I think there’s a valid question as to whether Clark and Smith took it ONE twist too far, but I do admire how it circles back to the original family ties that started it all. From my perspective, that last twist threatens to take this story into more familiar terrain that we’ve seen in some way, shape or form in other things we’ve watched. In contrast, everything up to that finale was decisively original. Don’t get me wrong, I’m okay with the ending, I still felt like it worked and of course it gives “Mirror” the opportunity to tie up some loose details – all I’m saying is that for a script that had such originality to it for like, a good ninety percent of its length, the biggest twist of all felt like Clark and Smith seemed to choose not to prioritize that originality as much right at the very end of the film. All things considered, I think “Mirror” deserves a solid four stars out of five; it’s a wild, thought-provoking family drama/thriller combined, and it kept me engaged from start to finish. |
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