Raindance Film Festival 2012 – Indebted
★★★★☆
Indebted is an impressive debut feature from Director Márton Jelinkó and has quite rightly been nominated for the Best Debut award for the Raindance Film Festival.
It tells the story of Elli (Heidi Linden), a biology student with overdue bills and a cleaning job that doesn’t cover her bills and extravagant party lifestyle. She gets so desperate she even takes her dead grandmother’s pearl necklace to the pawn brokers pay the bills. After a mix up worth a one night stand, Elli finds it easy to fall into a life of prostitution. meanwhile, the other female lead, Iris (Kristina Puukko) is part of a gang of violent debt collectors who have a time limit to obtain a huge amount of money from various sources. Part of this underworld gang is Andrei (Juha Arola) who, after almost dying on a raid, becomes the object of Iris’ affections. By coincidence, he also meets Elli in a bar and the two embark upon a romance away from the dangers of loan sharks.
The film’s not perfect. lot of the time’s the camera work’s shaky, threatening to provide the audience with the additional sensation of motion sickness. In addition to that, the translation for the subtitles is mostly incorrect and sometimes doesn’t make sense. These are minor flaws however and completely forgivable as the real draw to this film is the drama that unfolds.
In this intensely dramatic debut feature, Marton Jelinko weaves a web of lies, mistrust, danger and love. Headed by two strong women as the leads, it’s very much a story of how ordinary people deal with being thrown into extraordinary situations. The ticking time bomb effect initiated from the very start catapults the story to it’s conclusion in a quick paced riot of plot twists and drama.
The film is driven by the cast’s performances of the damaged characters, making even the most unseemly of characters feel human and on some level, relatable. Indebted stars Kristiina Puukko, Heidi Lindén, Juha-Tapio Arola and is directed by Marton Jelinko.
Catch the UK Premiere at Raindance Film Festival on Saturday 29th September.
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