Excision
Director: Richard Bates Jr.
Writer: Richard Bates Jr.
Cast: AnnaLynne McCord, Traci Lords, Ariel Winter, Roger Bart, Jeremy Sumpter, John Waters, Malcolm McDowell, Marlee Matlin, Matthew Gray Gubler, Ray Wise
Part of: /slash Filmfestival

Plot:
Pauline (AnnyLynne McCord) lives with her parents (Tracie Lords, Roger Bart) and her little sister Grace (Ariel Winter) who has Cystic Fibrosis and needs a lung transplant. So Pauline dreams of a career in medicine. But she has issues. She has vivid deams full of blood and sex, that she would like to enact in real life by sleeping with a guy for the first time while on her period. Her mother sees that she’s struggling but believes that with a little strictness and the support of her church they can work through the problems.

Excision is absolutely incredible and amazing. AnnaLynne McCord is perfect, the whole movie is atmospheric and just plain wonderful.

It is hard to believe that this is Richard Bates Jr.’s first movie (apart from the short film this film is based on). Both the script and the direction are mature and perfectly spot-on. Pauline as a character was very well drawn and her psychological situation captured with extreme sensitivity. There’s a girl whose cries for help are never heard.

With that subject matter, the film runs the risk of becoming extremely depressing. And while there are instances of humor to light things up a little bit, it certainly isn’t a feel good film.

The dream sequences were things of beauty. Bloody, gory beauty, certainly, but wonderfully set in scence, shot and just generally made. But the absolutle best part of the film was AnnaLynne McCord and her performance. She has the ability to translate Pauline’s psychological state to a very phyiscal expression and it was just amazing to watch. Though the rest of the cast was really good as well, especially Traci Lords, AnnaLynne McCord just really stole the movie from everybody else.

The whole movie just left me breathless and I was completely taken in by it. It was intense and brilliant and I might keep on gushing until you see it yourself.

Summarising: I was completely impressed by it.