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Film: Mailer Daemon
Year: 2020
Director: John Mudge
Writer: John Mudge
Starring: Joey Harmon, Rain Scott-Catoire and David Tiefen
Review:
I was turned on to this when writer/director John Mudge reached out to me through my blog asking if I’d be willing to check out this short. As I’ve stated before, I’m always down to help independent artists so I informed him that I would love to. This is an interesting story of when you send you an e-mail and that it bounces back from the ‘Mailer Daemon’.
We’re introduced to this company called Lighthouse through what looks to be like a 1980’s VHS before taking us to meet Todd (Joey Harmon). He’s currently working as a Mailer Daemon with his boss Jeff (David Tiefen) breathing down his neck. Jeff is trying to get promoted and the Mailer Daemons are really workers with no other lot in life. They’re a sort of demon as well. Jeff is quite mean and threatens him if he doesn’t work harder.
Todd’s life changes though when he receives a later from Kelley (Rain Scott-Catoire). He sends a personal response that could alter his life if found out, as Mailer Daemons get repurposed when they can no longer do their job.
The first thing that struck me, as someone who works in an office, this is an interesting look at how monotonous it can be. Todd is literally just getting e-mails that are coming in written form and then replying back that the message could not be delivered as it was sent. This is an interesting thing that I started to think about. What if there was really someone sending out these messages I’ve gotten probably hundreds of times. It is interesting to play on Daemon as well by having Todd be a blue, demon-like creature as well.
If I have any gripes with the film, it would just be how it played out. I personally would have liked to see this go darker than what we got. I’m not necessarily going to hold that against this movie as this is really much more of a comedy. I found Harmon’s performance interesting too. Since his whole life seems to be what he’s doing now, he needs Kelley to explain things to him that works out in making this pretty funny as well.
I would have to give her credit here. Scott-Catoire has a cute look about her and she brought not only attitude to the role but also quirkiness. I had an interesting feeling while watching this where I’ve had my girlfriend or other women I’ve dated tell me they just want me to listen and not try to fix their problem. Todd doesn’t understand and I took this as something that is ingrained in masculinity. It did make me laugh for sure. I thought the rest of the cast rounded this out for what was needed as well.
The pacing for this was solid. I like how they establish this mythology and the premise of this. We get introduced to the problem and how it plays out as well. I never found myself bored either. As I said before, I would have liked this to play out a bit differently, but that’s just me. The effects also work well for it. I was staring at the make-up for Todd and I’m not going to lie, it amazed me. The color of his skin is unreal and done so well. I also like that the office he’s working in fits to the VHS style quality we got early in the movie. This is really a fun short film that I would definitely recommend giving a viewing if you get the chance. This is really a fun comedy with some slight horror elements with it, both having a demon and working in an office.
My Rating: 7 out of 10