 Sometimes I Think About Dying){kind=link}
When screening/scaling for depression, it has been common practice to ask about suicidal ideation. How often do you think about dying? Never, Rarely/Sometimes, Always, or Have You Attempted Suicide? Director Rachel Lambert and co-writers (Stefanie Abel Horowitz, Kevin Armento, and Katy Wright-Mead) Sometimes I Think About Dying‘s protagonist, Fran (played by Daisy Ridley), is someone who probably would never seek help with depression, but whose answer would probably fall somewhere in the middle, depending on when you caught her.
The film does a good job of showing the monotony of showing up and doing a job when the work/workplace is just that, a job, and not something you love. In the way it captures the bits of mundane conversations as Fran perceives them. The drudgery of it all. Leading her escape to these fantasies of dying, even if she comes right back to where she is, trudging along. Except, later she claims to love her job. Is this the truth, or her hiding her true feelings? Is cottage cheese really her favourite food, or is that also just something she says to push people away? Either way, the dichotomy of her fantastical/subconscious desire to not be doing what she’s doing anymore is paralleled nicely at the top with her co-worker Carol (played by Marcia DeBonis) retiring and leaving the office behind.
Fran’s monotony is shaken up when Robert (played by Dave Merheje) arrives as a new hire, and he privately asks her for help with a task and reveals he has never had a job before. Who is this man that has never had a job before? A movie lover, a mystery, and someone with whom Fran wants to connect and struggles to open up about herself. However, it’s not just her that makes creating this new connection difficult. He kind of ghosts her after their first outside interaction, and you don’t need dialogue to know that as Fran moves around the office space in the following days, she’s trying to figure out what she did wrong. I wanted to reach through my screen and tell her it wasn’t her, and I was a little upset with how easily she let him off each time. But I get it she’s seeking a connection with the first person that’s shown a vague interest in her and her cottage cheese-loving ways.
Robert went to McGill, a shout-out to Canada, even though this film wasn’t filmed in Canada. Yes, apparently the dreary and sometimes wet hills and shores are not those of British Columbia as is usually the case for these kinds of projects, but actually Oregon. I was shocked it wasn’t just stock footage or a B-Unit in Oregon to capture establishing shots. There’s a reason Vancouver (and nearby) usually gets all the work. It has a great infrastructure on top of all the tax credits. So, the producers must have gotten a great deal on locations in Oregon, or the tax credits must have worked out really well with their budget.
People wear a lot of masks in this film, as becomes very clear when we get to the party a diner worker invited them to, where another co-worker happens to be. Here they play the hot party game in the last calendar year for movies, murder mystery games being on theme. This version allows Fran to find acceptance with them because they think she’s just creative and not troubled.
The film is at times humorous, and at times emotionally draining. The colour palette is cold, and it often feels like we are seeing the same shots (when the fantasy world isn’t creeping in), but I think that’s the point. So, like Fran, we find beauty in what is right there in front of us the whole time.
Sometimes I Think About Dying premiered at Sundance in the US Dramatic Competition section.
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