World Narrative Competition : Bottled Up

USA | Narrative | World Premiere | SPOTLIGHT | 2013 | 81 min

DIRECTOR / SCREENPLAY Enid Zentelis

PRODUCERS Mandy Beckner, Anthony Brandonisio, Riel Roch Decter, Enid Zentelis, Erik Weigel, Melissa Leo

CINEMATOGRAPHER Daniel Sharnoff

WITH Melissa Leo, Marin Ireland, Josh Hamilton, Jamie Harrold, Nelson Landrieu

The subject surrounding substance abuse is rapidly and continuously spreading across the world, in my opinion it is way too common in our day and age. It seems to me that everyone has been affected by substance abuse one way or another. Enid Zentelis beautifully wrote and directed Bottled Up which articulates the story of a mother daughter duo dealing with the hard reality of prescription drug abuse. Faye (played by Oscar winning Melissa Leo) and her daughter Sylvie (Marin Ireland) reside in a small town and live a meek life. A few months earlier, Sylvie experienced a car accident and injured her back, she has been taking prescription pain killers and cannot seem to find physical comfort, and she often complains of being in severe pain and often mentions her excruciating need for her medication. Sylvie refuses to go to physical therapy and it becomes clear to everyone except her hopeful mother Faye that she has a severe addiction to her pain killers. 

A beacon of light comes to town and his name is Beckett, an awkward yet charming environmentalist studying the water that surrounds their town. Faye immediately recognizes that he might be able to help Sylvie and get her to open her eyes to the world of becoming sober. Beckett slowly integrates himself into their lives and Faye’s experiment towards a more sober Sylvie finally takes flight. In the end Faye is forced to make a concrete decision about what to do with Sylvie’s issues and it is truly heartbreaking to watch. Melissa Leo carries the film on her shoulders in the same way that her character Faye carries her daughter’s problem, I will admit that the other characters especially Beckett did not weight my full attention all the way through, some of the time I wished Sylvie’s character had shown even more of a physically driven dependence on her medication but that being said, the relationship between Faye and Sylvie was strong enough to pull everything together towards the end of the film and keep the message strong of how awful drug abuse can be for any sized family. Bottled Up is sometimes hard to watch because of the intense subject matter but knowledge is power and because drug abuse is very common, we should start accumulating a key sense of observation so that we may recognize signs of substance abuse amongst the ones we love so that we may live our lives happy and healthy. 

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Andrea Boulet
@AndreaMtl