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Currently Playing: LIPS LIKE FIRE | Omeleto

A man hallucinates. Sean is, on the surface, an ordinary young man, working, going out with friends and dating. But he has a secret: he's obsessed with an ASMR artist named Vanessa, whose videos command his attention more than any real-life woman he meets. Sean tries to date other women, but they can't compare to Vanessa's voice and face. But when he begins to experience hallucinations, the lines between reality and fantasy blur. Directed by Joel Valdes and written by Rey Francis, Scott Guinn and Joel Valdes, this short thriller-drama is a tantalizing and fascinating exploration of one man's addiction at the intersection of online culture, sexuality and mental health, as he grapples with the effects of his obsession with an alluring ASMR artist. Sean's descent into a psychological netherworld where reality has destabilized adds momentum to a sharply observed snapshot of how our extremely online lives can warp our real ones, often to detrimental effect. The storytelling first unfolds with an introspective hush, as Sean puts in his earbuds and settles in for the night, watching videos on his phone. Ordinary enough, but Sean doesn't just use the videos to relax; his enjoyment is interrupted when he gets a call from a friend, beckoning him to go out. As Sean meets a girl and they date, we observe that Sean's video habit is more than just killing time or entertainment. His date seems promising, but when things get intimate, they also get a little strange, as Sean experiences a strange hallucination that seems more than just a fantasy. As Sean, actor Rey Francis is deft in conveying how Sean's introspective nature can veer into passivity. He's contextualized in visuals that seem naturalistic, but with a growing creep of shadow and colors that darken over the course of his descent into alienation and depersonalization. Fitting for a film about ASMR, the score and sound design By Brian Bob Young work together to create an aural atmosphere that can seem ethereal one moment and ghostly the next, as if Sean is haunting his own life. That feeling continues to plague him, as does his hallucinations, until he realizes he needs to get help. It's a generally heartwarming development, and later Sean seems as if he moved on. But LIPS LIKE FIRE is just a bit too canny for that, ending on a note of uneasy ambiguity. Addictions can never really be left behind, often reshaping our selves, and they often linger in the nooks and crannies of everyday life, waiting to remind us they are there to fall back into. As the cultural conversation around online addictions and media platforms grow, the film is a short but potently heightened look at how virtual worlds can rewire our experience of reality, skewing our expectations and separating us from other people. LIPS LIKE FIRE. Courtesy of Jenerro Wade at https://banjobeaverproductions.com.