There’s something bubbling just below the surface of the mainstream Los Angeles film scene. A new wave of freaky micro-budget films that are pushing the boundaries of, and bulldozing the distinctions between, SOV horror trash, homemade genre movies, and video art. (It also appears that the Sunset Blvd. video-store and microcinema Whammy! Analog Media is a critical locus for the films’ creators.)
Devon Daniel Green’s Mid/Evil Times (2025) is a big belching fountain of creativity that’s spewed from this junky, too dumb yet too smart stew. With an SOV ethos and set of aesthetics, Green creates something that shirks commercial film form in the hopes of leaving the status quo with an irritating case of heartburn. Part Godard video-essay, part cheeky sci-fi-comedy, Green’s ambitious film is made up almost entirely of digressions that reflect the hyperactive contemporary mind and its maker’s own unique concerns and sense of humor. Cheap video effects, a myriad of locations, and layer upon layer of reality are built up and stripped away before the viewer’s eyes, who are treated to an unpredictable, refreshingly idiosyncratic, and surprisingly emotional ride.
In a nutshell, the plot of Mid/Evil Times revolves around a system in the future wherein petty criminals are sentenced to act in films. What we are watching is a reconstruction of one such film, now lost, by a group of students. It’s a mindfuck, but a whimsical sort of mindfuck that teaches the viewer to expect the unexpected as the film interrogates and plays with its own textuality.
With a large cast and low budget know-how, Green’s film is able to dig into a lot of ideas, mingling them if never quite perfectly synthesizing them into one clear statement. That, however, doesn’t seem to be the point. Watching Mid/Evil Times one gets the sense that the film is thinking for itself, its conclusions less important than its gleeful questioning of art, artifice, labor, authenticity, and more. The writer would be remiss if he failed to mention that the film is quite funny, equal parts goofball and ironically comedic, at points careening into truly dark territory with a vicious acerbic edge. The film’s sensibility bounces between different modes with impressive speed, buoyant in a way that video makes much more possible.
Green is now self-releasing his mini epic as a limited edition VHS. This seems appropriate given its format and its creative genesis. But, seeing a work of such naked daring with an audience is damn important—what’s the point of watching a trapeze act on YouTube when in person you can feel the tension of the person in the seat next to you? For cinephiles who are equally enamored with ambitious auteur fare such as Megalopolis (2024) or Psychos in Love (1987), your new movie just pulled up and it needs gas money.
Mid/Evil Times screens this evening, March 9, at the Roxy. Director Devon Daniel Green will be in attendance for a Q&A.
