Review of Stay (2005) by Joey K — 18 Jan 2011

Stay is a visual and psychological feast. Many of the shots in the film are either from a tilted camera angle or de-centered. The film makes strange even the most mundane of tasks; a New York cab ride is made interesting with repetition, rhythm, and atypical camera angles (one very close to the ground of the rear of the cab). The distinction between Sam/Henry and Lila/Athena remains unclear. Sudden transitions from one character to another, frosted windows that blur the characters, and shots of the actors in silhouette muddies the waters. The audience is kept guessing what is "real" in the narrative.

SPOILER ALERT:

I took the film to be a meditation on the confusion during one's last moments of life - when a person is in limbo between life and death. Stay begins and ends with Henry at the scene of a car accident. Henry's mind seems to be racing as he fights to STAY alive; he contemplates going to hell and grieves the loss of loved ones whose deaths he feels responsible for. The bulk of the film seems to stem from his brief encounters with the characters at the scene of the accident. The ambulance at the scene, for example, is #2121; the film is riddled with the number 21 - how old Henry will be on his next birthday, Sam and Lila living on the 21st floor, and Henry (or maybe it was Sam?) stands in front of a room # 21 at one point. Henry feels a connection to Sam and, therefore, replays certain moments over again in his head. Perhaps Sam felt this connection, too, which prompts him to ask Lila on a coffee date at the film's conclusion. Just as Henry creates his own worlds with his paintings, perhaps he has fashioned an alternate reality in the confusion during his final moments alive.