Still taken from ‘Spotless’

During the BFI Film Festival - we managed to interview winner of The Short Film Award, upcoming directorial talent, Milly Devine. Devine’s film ‘Spotless’ takes a pulchritudinous take on Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and the miraculous balancing act of order and chaos. This visual stimulating piece of film is reminiscent of Wes Anderson’s work and embodies the beauty of the short film in this 5 minute masterpiece.

The film captures the lives of OCD sufferer Phoebe and her slovenly housemate Molly and struggles of relationships and regulations. Phoebe’s type of OCD consists of Symmetry and Orderliness combined with Intrusive Thoughts which make her become irrational scared when things are not as they “should be” and can spend extreme periods of time trying to reorder the problem to stop the immense stress and fear caused by these Intrusive. “I feel like OCD suffers are stereotypes for being these over-exaggerated neat- freaks and have this ‘cartoonised’ condition”, Milly said she wanted to break the mould for OCD suffers in the media and take a fresh and honest approach when creating the character of Phoebe. Phoebe is actually based on Milly’s mother who suffers with OCD to this day, “I never understood my Mum’s condition until I was a teenage really, but remember not between able to sit down on the sofa until she’d wiped and sanitised every surface in the house, I genuinely thought she was mad to be quite honest”.

The films main theme is OCD, Phoebe’s character isn’t seen as a tortured soul or some kind over exaggerated “crazy” person as the vast majority of depictions show, however Spotless showed a refreshing perspective where OCD was just something there that Phoebe (and Molly) deal with rather than this debilitating disease. Of course for some sufferers do struggle living with OCD a have a horrible time coping with their condition but too often have film and TV have dramatized mental illness leaving this mass of stigma across our culture, imagining people crumbling at the slight speck of dust. But like all mental-illnesses their isn’t just one type of OCD there is a huge variety making it hard to define what type of OCD someone could have and what their symptoms could be. It’s important that we recognise films like this for its more honest and light-hearted approach and encourage more positive re-imaginings of sufferers.

Spotless Student Film Hit’s the Big ScreenThe emergence of new cinematic talent who took the BFI Film Festival by storm.

Graphic visual amplify the OCD ten tendencies and produce a visual order

During the BFI Film Festival - we managed to interview winner of The Short Film Award, upcoming directorial talent, Milly Devine. Devine’s film ‘Spotless’ takes a pulchritudinous take on Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and the miraculous balancing act of order and chaos. This visual stimulating piece of film is reminiscent of Wes Anderson’s work and embodies the beauty of the short film in this 5 minute masterpiece.

The film captures the lives of OCD sufferer Phoebe and her slovenly housemate Molly and struggles of relationships and regulations. Phoebe’s type of OCD consists of Symmetry and Orderliness combined with Intrusive Thoughts which make her become irrational scared when things are not as they “should be” and can spend extreme periods of time trying to reorder the problem to stop the immense stress and fear caused by these Intrusive. “I feel like OCD suffers are stereotypes for being these over-exaggerated neat- freaks and have this ‘cartoonised’ condition”, Milly said she wanted to break the mould for OCD suffers in the media and take a fresh and honest approach when creating the character of Phoebe. Phoebe is actually based on Milly’s mother who suffers with OCD to this day, “I never understood my Mum’s condition until I was a teenage really, but remember not between able to sit down on the sofa until she’d wiped and sanitised every surface in the house, I genuinely thought she was mad to be quite honest”.

The films main theme is OCD, Phoebe’s character isn’t seen as a tortured soul or some kind over exaggerated “crazy” person as the vast majority of depictions show, however Spotless showed a refreshing perspective where OCD was just something there that Phoebe (and Molly) deal with rather than this debilitating disease. Of course for some sufferers do struggle living with OCD a have a horrible time coping with their condition but too often have film and TV have dramatized mental illness leaving this mass of stigma across our culture, imagining people crumbling at the slight speck of dust. But like all mental-illnesses their isn’t just one type of OCD there is a huge variety making it hard to define what type of OCD someone could have and what their symptoms could be. It’s important that we recognise films like this for its more honest and light-hearted approach and encourage more positive re-imaginings of sufferers.

Spotless takes the OCD condition and adds a level of understated artistic quality similar to the likes of Richard Ayoade’s Submarine. The construction of these symmetrical shots help the average viewer transcend into this world of order composed from Phoebe’s intrusive thoughts. A truly captivating piece of film effortlessly captures a story of friendship and struggle without hiding the ups and downs of day-to-day life. I thoroughly enjoyed the film for its story, characters and overall presentation, the slick filming really enabled me as viewer to be part of this world you’re watching as if you’re actually in the room with Molly and Phoebe.When watching the short, something that stood out to us was the unconventional use of bird’s eye view shots with gave a new take on the perspective shot and really captured the OCD visual in a really distinctive way. Clear inspiration from cinematography great Wes Anderson really shine through with moments like this. In particularly, the dinner table scene where clear lines of symmetry between the two girls can be seen as they eat a bowl of spaghetti. Every detail has been considered, down to the salt and pepper dispensers and tulips which have been evenly placed across the shot to amplify the obsessive aesthetic in every aspect of the film. Despite the low budget and half-decent filming tech, you can see the meticulous planning and detail of shot showing the level of care in each frame giving a huge sense of pride for this young director.

With a small cast it can often leave space for more criticism but the performances by Molly Lambourne and Phoebe White stood out and held the narrative on their shoulders and carried it well together as a cohesive, balanced team allowing each other’s characters to smoothly bounce off each other as the polar-opposites. Devine picked both of the actresses’ based on their traits already and then augmented these personalities’ in the film to produce the realistic characterisation. Both actresses’ took on the roles well and gave the characters personality which you could tell went much deeper than the film itself. Molly Lambourne said she found her character to be “liberating extension of her messy beast inside”, this clear sense of connection between character and actor is what I think makes the performances so believable which is impressive for such young actors.

Honest, bittersweet and as distinct as youDevine has created the sense that we are all just ordinarily special. With help from the tremendous performances, a lovely sense of the