by Douglas
Messerli
Samuel Park
(screenwriter and director) Shakespeare's Sonnets / 2005 [7 minutes]
Park’s short film
about a 1946 Harvard dandy, Sebastian (Vincent Kartheiser), is an extremely
slight piece that is clearly worth deeper cinematic exploration.
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Supposedly based on Oscar Wilde’s “The Portrait of Mr. W. H.,” the film
deals little with Shakespeare’s sonnets and says nothing about Willie Hughes,
Shakespeare’s supposed “boy lover” who is at the center of Wilde’s story.
What little narrative remains in the work
concerns Sebastian’s love of a seemingly straight college colleague, Aaron
(Jordon Brower) who is about to marry his girlfriend, Annie (Corin Norton). Returning
from a luncheon with her and his mother, however, Aaron confesses that he doesn’t
truly love Annie, although he still intends to marry her.
Somehow Sebastian convinces his friend to
possibly stay the night with him. This work depends almost entirely on
Kartheiser’s slightly affected performance.
Los Angeles, July
17, 2024
Reprinted from World
Cinema Review (July 2024).
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