DVD & Chill

You’ve done this. We all have – gone to or invited a relative stranger inside your home to watch a movie. Some have good intentions, others do not, but how can you know? Do you care? These meet cutes can be awkward, can be steamy, they can be frightening, but what if in one night they’re all of the above…

DVD & Chill swept over me like a wave after an intense dream. And like a dream, the film stylistically exists in a figurative purgatory where many dimensions intersect. It’s why we wake from dreams often disoriented and confused or filled with passion, lust, inspiration, gratitude, or empathy, because reality exists on a curve. You can jump off a cliff, morph into a walrus, and fuck your ex all at the same time. The film is born from this dark realm.

Furthermore, DVD & Chill comes from my urge to tell a Hitchcockian story with people of color at its center. The film begins overlooking the entirety of Los Angeles, the city of angels, yet a city filled with demons, both human and otherwise, predators and opportunists, and in this film two of them do battle. And like any rare encounter between predators large and small, there’s tension and suspense, but also trickery in the pursuit of one’s prey. And it’s through this trickery the film finds its dark humor via celebrity worship and thus its satire.

Culturally, American people are obsessed with celebrity, and to me it’s a huge issue. It’s why a reality TV personality is President and crowds cheer when Oprah, the Rock, and Kanye flirt with running for the highest office. Many look to celebrities as deities to solve complex problems and seek their counsel in crisis no matter how unqualified. Celebrity is unmatched currency and many also feel they own these people. Cyrano, one of the film’s two central characters, the half-brother of Shemar Moor, spends his brother’s currency like a sticky trap to obtain what he otherwise couldn’t. Zora, the other title character feels a dire need to own this celebrity. She needs to taste it, hold it, and caress it for herself, which is why she’s on a spiritual mission to do so.

The subtext of this film gnaws at my insides and very much excites me, like all those concertgoers who took their pilgrimage to see Beyonce. I want to explore this absurdism that's become reality more in a feature. DVD & Chill additionally explores colorism and the seductive power of light skin. It connects past and present and the living and spirit worlds. At its core, we unpack a lot in this short, but hey you’ve watched movies with relative strangers before and anything can happen, right?