This is going to be chock full of spoilers. But I can say without hesitation that you should watch this movie. The imagery and way things are done is astounding. This is the only movie ever made by Andrew Getty. He wrote it and directed it. It was a long journey for him, and one that only completed after he died, with principal photography being done around 2002. Andrew died in 2015, and the film was completed by Michael Luceri, an editor and producer on the film. Which is a shame, because I would love to have seen more from this brilliant creative mind! Although based on things reported about the film after his death, a lot of this was based on things from his childhood.

The opening of this movie is one of the most surreal things I have watched. The opening monologue is captivating. The visual world we are presented with equally so. A dream sequence. A nightmare sequence. The way our psyche messes with us while we sleep is fascinating. Don’t blink during it. Don’t be distracted by something else, if you are you will just rewind it to watch again. Even if you are focused on it you might rewind it, I did! The culmination of the opening has Dennis lying in bed as a green tinted Michael Berryman appears. There is a struggle (and that is being generous) as Berryman manhandles Dennis, flipping him face down before climbing on top of him. At this point you wouldn’t be faulted for thinking Dennis is about to be raped, but you would be oh so wrong. Berryman begins installing a zipper onto the head and down the back of Dennis. Once he has it in place, he unzips it and forces his body into the body of Dennis!

The movie follows Dennis, a “kid” referred to in the movie as a mongoloid. A term that is no longer considered reasonable to use, but was replaced in the real world with Downs Syndrome. Dennis lives with his brother John in a large home that the brother is considering selling. He buys a really beautiful free standing full length mirror and puts it in Dennis’ room. The reason it goes in his room is because it matches the wood and will look amazing by the windows. Dennis doesn’t like it. He hates it. After Dennis threatens to break it, there is a physical altercation between the brothers resulting in Dennis agreeing to not damage it. Later we find out that Dennis hates seeing himself in a mirror. Which makes the brother a super jackass for forcing this into Dennis’ room. 

But then a strange thing happens. As he is looking in the mirror, the reflection of Dennis talks to him. The other version of Dennis is definitely a dark version of him. As the movie progresses, the reflection begins demanding that Dennis do bad things. The first bad thing this dark Dennis has him do is killing the neighbors cat. And it rapidly accelerates to a random kid he finds in a playground.

There is a dream state in this movie that is pervasive and unrelenting. At times we don’t even know whether we are in reality or the dream state. Dennis can’t escape the mirror in his waking life, and the impact it has in his dream state is even worse for him.

At one point, his mirror self forces him to move the mirror into a spot where it reflects back with another mirror. Something we have all done at some point. The fascinating aspect of seeing a technically infinite series of ourselves. But within the mirror selves, the Michael Berryman evil Dennis exists. And weird creepy things happen within the mirror. Weird creepy moments that I loved.

The use of mirrors in this is cool. Showing the inner struggle in a physical manifestation. But the physical manifestation gets super weird in the final act. John and Lydia (his girlfriend) have a day where the entire world has been twisted and turned inside out from what they are used to. It feels like they are experiencing what can only be described as Dennis nightmare dream state overwhelming their reality! At the same time Dennis tries to fight against his mirror self only to find the mirror empty! Until his mirror self races forward, steps out of the mirror, and forces Dennis into it! Trapping him while his evil self is now freed. The new evil Dennis doesn’t show any trace of the Down’s Syndrome. And then things get peculiar.

Around this time we learn from the brother that Dennis was a genius savant. Off the charts in everything. Until a fight between the brothers ended in Dennis falling down a flight of stairs. Resulting in the injured state that we have seen. It is hard to not jump out of the movie and scream “That’s not how that works.” But there is so much more going on here that you quickly fall back into the movie. Evil Dennis is out completely now and seems to have supernatural abilities. Preternatural? Extranatural? Not sure how to describe it. He does things he shouldn’t be able to. He has the ability to be in the right place to take advantage of an unsuspecting victim. Regardless of where he might have been a minute ago. Going back in the story a bit, there is a moment about halfway through where regular Dennis is attempting to do the bidding of evil Dennis, and he executes a surprise acrobatic jump scare that Van Damme would have been jealous of. You will know it when you see it, and will find yourself rewinding it to see it play out a second time! Clearly a moment where evil Dennis seems to be exerting control over Dennis. The final 10 minutes of this movie are surreal and violent and absolutely amazing.

I have zero hesitation in giving this a gold star. A truly magnificent find. And one I find myself wanting to rewatch as I write this. 

Post Script: And I did rewatch it as I cleaned this up before posting. An interesting thing though, as I read some bits about the creation of this movie, I stumbled across a scathing take on it. Discussion about how disjointed it was. Some things not making sense. I honestly think it plays into the nightmarish dream quality of the story.