Liz (Lauren Leon) is struggling emotionally–finding something at nearly every turn to frustrate her further and pull her deeper into a depression. As she attempts to step away from her family she finds herself falling back into a place in time of which she has fond memories. When she and her friends find a burnt CD with her late brother’s voice on it, they are sent on a journey that only he could have thought up. Remixed is the story of these friends rekindling a dwindling relationship with one another and themselves.
I understand what Remixed is going for, I get that it’s trying to tell its viewers how important we are, and what our legacy means to others. However, there are so many flaws present in this film that it destroys any hope of anyone really getting anything out of it. From the opening seconds of Remixed it’s clear that the film will struggle to convey emotion, that it would struggle to get any point across to viewers–and sadly I couldn't have been more right. Nothing ever comes to be, nothing really ever materializes into something that interests viewers. The concept is beautiful, but it’s never fully developed.
This film feels incomplete, sort of starting in the middle of things, never having developed a proper backstory, and then ending on something of a cliffhanger. We start with Liz, seemingly in the middle of something like a midlife crisis, and she quickly transitions to somewhere else, another part of her life (and another piece of her that we know nothing about). It feels at this point that Writers Frank A. Leon and L. Leon are trying to create exposition after a few minutes into Remixed, but I’m not sure that we ever get enough to make it whole. It often feels like there is more to the story that this team decided to leave out–like this is only a piece of a whole and a series of key details have been left out of the film. I struggled to find any level of cohesion in Remixed, and, honestly, I don’t think it exists.
Remixed is so sincere, and what it really wants to do is reach its audience and propel them toward finding themselves and being better people. This much of Remixed is clear, and it’s obvious that the team behind this film has the best of intentions, that they truly want to reach their viewers, shine some positive light on them, and help them make a change for the better. Again, this is understood–but knowing that this was the intention isn’t enough for the film to find success. The film is never fully developed, the story isn’t all that entertaining, and Liz is blurry, underwhelming as a result of all the pieces of her life that are left untapped.
I always hate criticizing the acting in a film. I feel like I’m calling these actors out and making things personal–but that couldn’t be further from the truth (and sometimes it’s important to discuss this aspect of the film). There are a series of things that go into the development of a character: acting, writing, directing, etc., and they all play a pivotal role in how viewers receive the actors’ performances in a film. I believe that the acting suffers in Remixed as a result of all of the things listed above. Never did I connect with the characters, never did they resonate with me–and Remixed continues to suffer from beginning to end as a result.
Remixed was made with the best of intentions, with the hope that it would reach out and touch viewers, helping to guide them toward something better in life–but that never comes to be. Remixed is difficult to get through, difficult to appreciate, and ultimately underdeveloped in almost every way. There’s something in there that makes me want to like the film, that makes me want to appreciate the fact that it was made, but it drowns in the wake of everything else that hinders the film as a whole.
Directed by Mitch Yapko.
Written by Frank A. Leon & Lauren Leon.
Starring Lauren Leon, Jon Chaffin, Emily Bolcik, Zackry Colston, Jose Duran, etc.
⭐⭐⭐½/10
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