Young office supervisor Amanda suffers from an exceptional type of body dysmorphia. While she does scrutinise her own appearance for perceived flaws, it’s physical ‘imperfections’ and ‘abnormalities’ in other people that she’s repulsed by. When a key worker in her team arrives with a hand wrapped in a bloodied bandage and clearly missing a finger, Amanda cannot contain her revulsion. But her determination to confront her fears and phobias leads her to an unorthodox psychiatrist and a very proactive type of aversion therapy.
Coming across a film like Fingers is one of the joys of the regular indie-flick watcher. This is a movie determined to avoid the regular, familiar notes of the off-beat thriller. Laced with dark humour, unexpected twists, and moments of up-close violence, the storyline of Fingers revels in confounding viewers’ expectations. Perspectives change, audience allegiances shift, and turning points in the plot lead to unpredictable outcomes.
Whether the influences are conscious or not, writer-director Juan Ortiz has made a movie the atmosphere of which will be recognised by fans of Hal Hartley and the Coen brothers. Fingers has the off-kilter, lengthy one-on-one dialogues that are the hallmarks of Hartley’s films like the sublime Trust and Simple Men; and that sense of danger teetering-on-the-edge of exploding that runs through the Coen’s cinematic canon.
Fingers is a film that arrives at an endpoint impossible to guess from its everyday opening scene, set in a nondescript donut shop (which quickly turns weird). The storylines of separate groups of characters are revealed as the movie progresses. The fate of all of these protagonists pivots, in one way or another, around the horror of amputated pinkies. Amanda’s psychological issues lead her through a series of increasingly questionable decisions as a final showdown looms. At times, it’s left open to the viewer to decide if they’re watching these events as they happen or instead are observers of Amanda’s distorted perception of reality.
The performances in Fingers are uniformly strong, and it’s difficult to pick out individual actors in the ensemble cast for praise. That said, there’s standout work from Sabina Friedman-Seitz as the intense and unsettled Amanda, from Stan Madray as the bewildered, digit-challenged Walter, and from Michael St. Michaels as the gruff and ruthless crime boss Fox.
It’s the inventiveness and commitment to crafting something different that makes this thriller stand out from so many of its genre contemporaries. This is a thoroughly entertaining watch that revels in delivering an unpredictable story, which manages to continually surprise without those redirects feeling arbitrary. If you’re after a clever crime caper with an unusually strong narrative grip, you’d be well advised to get your hands on Fingers.
