Madeleine Olnek's Countertransference premiering at SXSW this Saturday at 11 a.m. in the Reel Shorts 1 showcase is a darkly humorous film complete with naked therapists, not so abnormal people in therapy, and a therapist's partition that acts like a "sponge."
Bottom line is Olnek has made 15 minutes of hilarious commentary, drifting between sad, and hinging on the ridiculous, but Countertransference is masochistic humor at its finest. While the film seems absurdly surreal, the ever present feeling of 'truth is stranger than fiction' permeates the screen. People can't make stuff this ridiculous up, it has to be birthed somewhere on our lonely little ball of mud.
Comedies are not a genre favorite of mine, but placed in this context I was pleasantly surprised by this effort. I was afraid at first the film would offer up a storyline of cumbersome cynicism that has come to saturate almost everything that is placed in front of our weary eyes, but the film accomplished exactly the opposite, genuine and original humor. Bravo.
Be careful if you watch it and don't like it they just might sue you.
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