Romantic comedies often tolerate obsessive, creepy or restraining-order-inducing behavior which is only justified when the couple gets together in the end. In a Day, satisfies both these requirements (odd behavior, happy ending) and does so in such a normal way that just adds a hint of disquiet.
That disquiet stems from a simple, time-honored plot: Girl gets hit in head with coffee cup. Boy is exceedingly nice to girl, gives her “perfect day.” Boy gets Girl.
The combination of unknown actors and the phrase “whimsical romantic indie drama” didn’t do much to attract me to the movie, but two things did hold my interest: It was 80 minutes and it was British.
I’m a firm believer that different types of movies should strive for a set running time. Comedies should aim for the 90-minute mark. Epics are permitted no less than two, but no more than three hours. Sports movies should range from an hour and 45 minutes to 2 hours max. Thrillers should try to come in below 2 hours, anything beyond that and you’re really pushing it. Musicals (and this runs against common practice) should never, ever exceed 2 hours. One of the issues I have with movies like West Side Story and The Music Man isn’t the songs themselves but the running time. There’s only so much time dancing street rumbles can fill and 152 minutes is far too much time to watch a Romeo and Juliet story that can be told effectively in a 20 minute episode of Animaniacs.
It’s not that I wish to impose Draconian measures for directors to hit an optimal film time, there just should be guidelines based on how hard it is to sustain interest within a given genre. There are exceptions, of course, but the fact is, 90 percent of movies can be made better by telling a tighter story, while only 10 percent actually benefit from the various “directors cuts” and “extended editions” that are pushed upon us.
Granted, directors can do what they want to, especially if the running time itself figures into what they are trying to say, even if it detracts from the viewing experience. For example, Andy Worhol’s 12-hour Empire features a static, real-time shot of the Empire State Building. That’s it. While we could easily get the same effect through a 3-minute time-lapse video posted to YouTube, but this would go against Worhol’s goal of making all his movies unwatchable.
But I digress. I bring this up because another five minutes added to In a Day would’ve been fatal.
One of the things the movie does right is it refrains from telling us everything about our characters right up front; things are allowed to unfold. We find out that The Girl (Ashley) has a passion for playing jazz piano, which doesn’t surface until the middle of the second act. Had this been a more conventional movie, the script would’ve had her say an awkwardly placed “Gee, I wish I was playing jazz piano right about now,” sometime in the first five minutes.
Obviously, though, you can’t reveal The Boy’s (Michael) motivations up front, because it’s this one and only thing that keeps the viewer’s interest. So the entire time you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop, or more descriptively, the other hand to get strangle-y.
Our mysterious stranger encourages our heroine to keep drinking Champaign, visits her in her sandwich shop daily, asks her to go clothes shopping with him and leads her to a secluded park. In any other movie, this would signal a one way ticket to Serial Killer Central, but since we are assured that this is a “whimsical romantic indie drama,” we know that the big reveal at the end isn’t getting to see Michael’s collection of sharp kitchen utensils. Though he keeps dropping hints that there is a benefactor who wishes her to have a good day, it seems like it’s time to cue the staccato strings.
He, disappointingly, reveals that he is a schoolyard tormentor who is so remorseful that he must track Ashley down years later in order to tell her he’s sorry (belated spoiler alert). One wonders if “In a Day” serves as a bit of catharsis on the part of the filmmakers who could’ve drawn on their own experiences as an apologetic bully.
Now that’s creepy.
