Julien Neaves, Caribbean Head Writer
In my never-ending effort to seek out and review Caribbean content I have been checking out the offerings on the Caribbean One TV app. And one of those offerings was short film Words Unspoken from St Vincent and the Grenadines.
Now I must apologise for the images for this review as for the life of me I could not find one image of this film online. So I settled on using photos of the stars, Akley Olton and Lia Gajadhar, from their Facebook accounts (both the featured image and the one below). My apologies.
Written and directed by Satya Collymore and Rena Pilgrim, Words Unspoken is the story of a couple in a strained relationship. And true to the title there is no audible dialogue and the only music is played at the end. The only sounds heard (other than the aforementioned music) are the sounds of the couple’s early morning routine. Each splash, pour and knock is accentuated and effectively jarring.
The silence also forces the two actors to use their body language and facial expressions to convey all their thoughts and emotions, and both do a very good job, especially Gajadhar. While I didn’t know the details of their troubled relationship I felt and understood the feelings of the couple, and it was quite affecting. There are also some striking visuals here which I enjoyed.
An artistic little film with a skillful use of silence, I just have to say something about Words Unspoken.
Editor Jules Score: 7.5 out of 10
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Julien “Editor Jules” Neaves is a TARDIS-flying, Force-using Trekkie whose bedroom stories were by Freddy Krueger, learned to be a superhero from Marvel, but dreams of being Batman. I love promoting Caribbean film (Cariwood), creating board games and I am an aspiring author. I say things like “12 flavours of awesome sauce”. Read more.