Syrup – Overview/ Review (with Spoilers)

Overview

Image, marketing and sex(ism). That pretty much that sums up Syrup.

Review (with Spoilers)

What drew me to this film was a .gif set I’ve been seeing on Tumblr for months dealing with the Amber Heard’s character giving advice to women on honing the various labels given to them and combining them to be a bad ass. So, after finally finding out this movie is where the .gif set came from, I decided to watch it. And I learned perhaps that .gif set was the best part of the movie.

Characters & Story

We begin the movie by meeting Scat (played by Shiloh Fernandez) a young man who seemingly went to college, and now has all these bright ideas but not a clue how to execute them. Alongside him is a young man known as Sneaky Pete (played by Kellan Lutz), who is silent for most of the movie, and then there is 6 (played by Amber Heard) who is the person who makes all of Scat’s dreams come true. Well, before they are snatched from him.

The overall motion picture feels like a comedic take on how a product is marketed and how people market themselves. There is a lot of talk about how a person’s image can only get so far, and how much control and influence there is in terms of a person creating and maintaining said image. Also, there is a decent amount of sexism noted in the subplot, but the movie never takes that issue serious enough to get the point across.

Praise

The best thing about this movie to me was Amber Heard. Though I have seen some of the films she has worked on like Zombieland, Pineapple Express, and The Joneses, she never really stood out amongst the million and one blonde hair and light colored eyed girls out there. However, in this film, she makes quite the statement and if it was a better overall production, I think it would have done wonders for her careers.

Heard’s 6, is the type of character which represents this odd sort of balance of all the people she speaks about in the aforementioned .gif set that led me to see this film. Her claim, of which she is both victimized by and uses to her advantage is that she has the sexual appeal of the slut; the wisdom of the mother; independence of the bitch; and integrity of the virgin. Of which, is used to show the complex balance a woman like her has to have when working in a corporation when she is often talked down to, flirted with, and hardly taken seriously when the moment calls for it. Really making it so that, you almost feel like her character as a whole deserves a better movie to explore the facets of a woman in a corporation, but unfortunately, she is not the focus of the film, so all we get is wasted potential.

Criticism

And the reason why I say we only get wasted potential is because Scat is the lead and pretty much everything revolves around him. Now, I won’t say Scat isn’t likable, but in a world where there are the Jesse Eisenberg types, Shiloh Fernandez just doesn’t have the ability to not be associated with the look of the arrogant man-child who for some reason gets his way. Due to this, it is really hard to root for Scat. Then you have to take note of what Scat’s character does to 6’s. Upon meeting 6, we are presented with a 21-year-old, college graduate who has all the marbles and then Scat comes in off the street and she decides to invest in the kid. This includes such strange things as letting him sleep on her couch, and then potentially back-stabbing him. And from there the story gets weirder and weirder for you aren’t sure if they are trying to have those two fall in love, make 6 seem like a woman who loves power or a woman who just preys on people with ideas who she can hitch her wagon to.

And really, that is probably the big reason I was just not a huge fan of the movie overall.

Overall: TV Viewing

The points mentioned in the film, and the illustration through what happens, presented an interesting spin on marketing. Even the idea of how people market themselves with their image, what they let others know about their lives and all that, present interesting points worth seeing. However, I felt the romantic subplot of the film was just so unnecessary and it took Heard’s well-written character and flushed it down the drain. Hence why I say this is worth TV viewing. To pay money to rent this just seems like a waste and really, it isn’t something worth seeking out immediately. The .gif set with Heard explaining the building blocks for 6’s character is probably the most interesting part, and unfortunately, everything thereafter is just a simple man’s fantasy of having it all: money, the girl, and praise.