The opening scene of Streamer introduces us to Jared
(co-writer/producer/director Jared Bratt).
In this brief but stirring scene, Jared puts it all out there: he's the
quintessential lonely millennial incel man, a fedora short of basically every
creepy MRA stereotype. Jared's demeanor
is somehow pathetic, sad, and frightening all at the same time. Bratt absolutely sells it, brilliantly
setting the stage for a dark and thoughtful—if occasionally by-the-numbers—film
that’s as much a character study as it is a thriller.
The story kicks in when Jared discovers that his favorite cam girl (Tanya Lee) lives in his apartment building. This premise is a tad too convenient and even a bit flimsy, yet surprisingly easy to overlook as the story unfolds. Jared is soon faced with quite a quandary, as he strives to grow his "real life" relationship with this woman while keeping her firmly in his fantasies. As expected, the reality of the situation soon sets in and things get a little too real.
The character of Jared is surprisingly complex for what he appears to be. In the opening scene he does make a brutal first impression, and that’s what makes the whole thing so difficult. Jared is a man the audience really wants to hate, and certainly does himself no favors. But Bratt makes it fascinating to watch. Bratt somehow takes a man whose emotional development arrested as a teenager and permanently stayed that way, and dares the audience to feel sympathy for him. It's such a crazy idea that it just might work, and against your better judgement it does. It's not unusual for a movie to make us feel borderline unclean for liking or even feeling for a character we have no business feeling anything for other than disdain, but Bratt somehow has a way about him that makes this character, and by proxy the movie, work effectively.
The story kicks in when Jared discovers that his favorite cam girl (Tanya Lee) lives in his apartment building. This premise is a tad too convenient and even a bit flimsy, yet surprisingly easy to overlook as the story unfolds. Jared is soon faced with quite a quandary, as he strives to grow his "real life" relationship with this woman while keeping her firmly in his fantasies. As expected, the reality of the situation soon sets in and things get a little too real.
The character of Jared is surprisingly complex for what he appears to be. In the opening scene he does make a brutal first impression, and that’s what makes the whole thing so difficult. Jared is a man the audience really wants to hate, and certainly does himself no favors. But Bratt makes it fascinating to watch. Bratt somehow takes a man whose emotional development arrested as a teenager and permanently stayed that way, and dares the audience to feel sympathy for him. It's such a crazy idea that it just might work, and against your better judgement it does. It's not unusual for a movie to make us feel borderline unclean for liking or even feeling for a character we have no business feeling anything for other than disdain, but Bratt somehow has a way about him that makes this character, and by proxy the movie, work effectively.
That's not to say that Streamer is the most original or inventive film. Streamer has a structure that feels familiar, even too much so, despite the modern approach. Jared is not all that dissimilar to Tom, Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character in 2009's (500) Days of Summer, complete with undeserved sense of middle class white male entitlement. But while Tom was played primarily for laughs (albeit awkward ones), Jared is a straight-up creeper. Still, to some extent we've seen him, and this movie, before. As fascinated and horrified as the audience is with Jared, it's difficult to shake the familiarity of it all.
Streamer has a lot of the most common problems that self-made
micro-indies have. The film has a more
polished look than similar films, but there's occasionally a slight
amateurishness to some of the performances, dialogue and even editing. But Jared Bratt is the secret weapon of Streamer. He takes what could easily have been a
despicable and one-dimensional character and gives him depth and dimension,
with a dark and riveting performance that gets under your skin and won't easily
be forgotten. Thanks to Bratt's
performance, Streamer overcomes the occasional weak and spotty elements
and becomes a dark, twisted, and fascinating character study.
Score
-Mike Stec