The Anatomy Maestro
New York, New York, the city that never sleeps, home to eight million people, and with a population that size a statistical inevitability that more than a handful of them will be dangerous freaks, among them Cooper, sitting in his apartment watching horror films and workout videos, the excess of the eighties in all its gory dayglo glory.
Far below, making her way home with her headphones on and in a dream as she dances on the streets and past the neon-lit shops to the music only she can hear, Zoe exists in another world, oblivious to the man in black who has followed her from the subway exit to her apartment block, silently entering the building and ascending the stairs behind her as she reaches for her keys…
Written and directed by Drew Maxwell Wiess, The Anatomy Maestro stars Addie Guidry as Zoe and Ed Malone as Cooper, he first seen bathed in the blue glow of the television screen and the red light of the candle flame in a darkened room, she residing in a more luxuriously furnished and brightly lit abode, though one she is obliged to share with her mother, played by Yuna Shapatava.
Cooper masked and Zoe wearing her headphones, both are consciously limiting their senses, experiencing the city in their own way, both conditioned by circumstances in which they exist, one surrounded by images of writhing flesh and violence, the other by parental pressure to become a successful surgeon, to see flesh as a canvas where art is only achieved through practice.
One the predator and the other the prey, it is a short film of contrasts and unexpected relationships and dynamics, undeniably tied to New York City yet strongly influenced by Italian cinema as it harks back to the seventies with grain and speckles recreating the feel of aging celluloid and the distinct pop on the audio track as the reel changes.
Holding a mirror to both the butcher and the surgeon and what drives them, The Anatomy Maestro is a piece of confusion and dislocation with abrupt transitions rather than segues, filled with distorting lenses and awkward angles, though living in a world of plastic surgery emulating impossible perfection alongside guns and firing ranges to destroy it again, sanity may already be waiting impatiently on the platform for the next train out of town.
The Anatomy Maestro is available on the Arrow platform now
