Co-directed by Karl Jenner and Lyndsay Sarah, Guilt is another story about how screwed up a psychologist is and the field of psychiatry. The story follows a psychologist, played by Janet Shay. Shay co-wrote the script with Sarah. Jessie is the psychologist’s name, and she feels angry about all the world’s child abuse. As a child psychologist, she goes vigilant by targeting child sex offenders. It’s not just any offenders, but those who escaped severe sentences. As the story progresses, Jessie has second thoughts about her bent on being a vigilante when she questions a former case with disturbing revelations—perhaps she has gone too far. The movie is available on Amazon.
A small-budget film with a limp script. The acting is functional but misses the underlying realistic angst of the anticipation of knocking off a few child offenders. The writing is void of a lot of dialogue, which is probably good since the actors lack harmony in the storytelling—like disjointed communications of “Now, why am I here?”
A background story of some characters would have added to the storytelling. Perhaps the two writers could have created more depth in their dialogue. According to the co-directors statement, “Dipping our toe into a feature film for the first time, we knew we would have to be as self-sufficient as possible. Guilt is a self-funded project by us both, but also two of our filmmaking buddies.”
Their statement says quite a bit, as Guilt is their first movie. “We carried out most of the roles and labor ourselves from the birth of the story idea to the last stages of post-production, and we’re still going. Quite an achievement, and sure, we’re proud of each other. Most importantly, we think we proved that you don’t necessarily require a big budget (or even a reasonably sized one) to produce a noteworthy film. It’s the team behind the film that counts,” they added.
Shots of stalking, walking, and dripping water faucets are standard-issue suspense/thriller ploys that fall flat in dry sand—no substance. The filmmakers could’ve learned about camera angles, timing, and undercurrents from Martin Scorsese.
I kept waiting for Jessie to roll with the revelations and change as a character, to no avail. The ending came abruptly without the movie offering any meaning to what I just saw. Inclusion was slow, tedious, and had multiple substantial plot holes, making me frustrated because they were obvious. They are first-time filmmakers, and it shows, but you have to admire them for completing the movie and getting it distributed.
The movie also stars Hayley Flowers and Sandra Stockley.