Cerebrum (2022) Poster

(2022)

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5/10
Cerebrum
BandSAboutMovies18 May 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Will (Tobi King Bakare) wakes up from a bad dream, but in truth, he's waking up in the hospital. He's been in a coma for more than a year and has no idea how it happened, where he is or what has gone on while he's been asleep.

As he regains control of his body and begins to stitch together his mind, he finds his scientist father Richard (Steve Oram) has become more controlling than ever, refusing to allow him to see his mother Amelia (Ramona von Pusch), who also barely survived whatever put them both into intensive care.

Director and writer Sebastien Blanc does a great job of not only establishing Will's survivor's guilt but also his feelings of detachment as he's lost his adoptive mother and it's hammered home how little Richard wanted a son, much less a black child. The only time they seem to bond is horrifying, as they are bathed in red light as father invites son to hysterically laugh at the things that most upset the both of them,

Of course, the truth -- why is Richard seeing so many blonde women? -- is closer to The Brain That Wouldn't Die than a tender drama about reconnection and loss of a parent. It's more about how far someone will go to keep someone in their life. It might be selling itself as a genre film, sure, but it has a really deep emotional tug within the expected against nature surgical science fiction movie moments.
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7/10
Interesting contemplation of consciousness and life
jmbovan-47-16017319 May 2023
Interesting contemplation of consciousness and life. The main character wakes from a coma unable to speak and with questions related to the absence of his mother. In flashbacks, we see some elements related to his mother and his father. But, these memories seem to question what is a reality and what the character is fantasy.

To avoid spoilers, I will talk abstractly of themes developed. In a parallel to contemplation of AI, these ideas are explored through personhood, identity, and body integrity. The confusion of fantasy (in the form of memories) and reality propel notions of what is living, what is identity, and do both need to align.

The film has some drawbacks given the limitations of a character that largely doesn't speak, and some heavy emphasis on specific characteristics for other characters to differentiate between reality, fantasy, and the merger of the two.

Worth a watch but only for those that want to think, not be numbed by mystery and action.
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