With a title like Videoman I thought I was in for a bio-pic of the bloke who used to drive around where I live in a big red van armed with hundreds of tapes to rent. Sadly it wasn’t, it was however a very interesting film from Sweden which by the cover you’d think was a Videodrome rip-off it certainly isn’t that.
Ennio Mildena owned the best video shop around in the 1980 and 90’s, unfortunately we are in the age of DVD, blu-ray and streaming so the humble VHS is rather past it. As many of you know videotapes are highly collectible especially horror and Ennio has recreated his famous shop in a dingy basement where he trades in tapes. He is seriously in debt but quite by chance he comes across a very rare tape and the infamous ‘Faceless’ video collector contacts him and offers him enough cash to clear his debts.
There is also a parallel story of Simone, a lover of all things 80’s (complete with frizzy hair) in a crappy job, estranged from her daughter and a serious alcoholic. The two of them begin a ‘sort of’ relationship but Ennio has other problems, someone has stole the prized tape and ‘Faceless’ is apparently a bit of a psycho.
There are all sorts of things going on in Videoman, relationships, trippy sequences and some really oddball characters. Is it a horror film, no. Is it a thriller, no. Is it another genre, no not really. It’s almost in a category of it’s own as it’s a bit odd but never boring and I really had no idea where the film was going. That is a nice refreshing change and due to that, it’s well worth checking out. You may hate it or you may love it, I just really loved the premise and the way things panned out which made it all a bit different complete with it’s retro synth score.