Griff the Invisible
Director: Leon Ford
Writer: Leon Ford
Cast: Ryan Kwanten, Maeve Dermody, Patrick Brammall, Toby Schmitz
Part of: /slash Filmfestival

Plot:
Griff (Ryan Kwanten) is a socially awkward office worker who spends his free time pretending to be a superhero and continuously working on ways to become invisible. When his brother Tim (Patrick Brammall) introduces his new girlfriend Melody (Maeve Dermody) [who is trying to walk through walls] to Griff, both Melody and Griff know immediately that they are two of a kind.

Griff the Invisible is a cute film, but it doesn’t make the jump to great. For that, there is too much romanticizing going on for my taste.

You know, it’s one thing to live with your head in the clouds and to have an active imagination, but the way Griff lives his fantasy crosses the line into delusional territory is dangerous and should not be shrugged off with just, “well, it’s play pretend”. Mental illnesses are not that simple or easy and should not be portrayed as such. That’s romanticization at its worst.

Anyway, apart from that it’s also Ryan Kwanten who not only didn’t impress me a whole lot, but with the dark hair and eyes he downright irritated me. That’s the problem with being Jason Stackhouse as much as he is. When he’s not, it’s extremely weird.

But completely making up for that is Patrick Brammall who is absolutely brilliant as Griff’s down-to-earth brother.

And there are really awesome bits to the film as a whole. The pranks Griff plays on the bully in his office are really funny. And whenver they show the difference between Griff’s (and Melody’s) imagination and the real world the movie really is at its best.

Summarising: Sweet, but not much more.