A gay actor hoping for a break negotiates friendships, career and a ghost in Phantom Project, a sweet featherweight Valentine to director-writer Roberto Doveris’ pals and his Santiago milieu. Held together by the conspicuous charm of protagonist Juan Cano, the film is a simulacrum of a certain low-key Millenial approach to life in which concerns don’t extend much beyond one’s social circle and success is measured by the number of followers you have on your YouTube channel. The vaguely pesky ghost is likely to be read as a manifestation of the niggling things that bother our subconscious, and like the movie as a whole, it’s slightly playful, mildly intriguing and utterly insubstantial. Exuding a gentle, unpretentious indie appeal, Phantom Project will see some traction on the LGBTQ circuit but need not be limited to that demographic.
Pablo (Cano, also in Doveris’ debut Las Plantas), around thirty, makes ends meet by renting out a room in his apartment and picking up odd acting jobs like being a mock patient in med school class enactments. It’s kind of a low moment in his life – he’s still not over his breakup with rising YouTuber Francisco Moraga (Fernando Castillo), he’s frustrated by limited acting opportunities, and what’s more his flighty housemate is moving out, leaving little chance Pablo will get the two months rent he’s owed. There’s also the problem of unexpected noises and occasional breakages in the apartment, which he puts down to creaky pipes and Susan, the dog his departed housemate leaves behind.
Audiences know Susan is just as perplexed as Pablo. Using a similar drawn line device he briefly employed in Las Plantas, Doveris visualizes the gender-fluid ghost via quickly sketched, constantly changing white squiggles and lines seen hovering around objects and dropping various articles. It (they?) also appears connected in some way to a retro cardigan that Pablo found when he moved in, which becomes a totemic item that connects him with an unspecified past and accompanies him towards an unknowable future. There’s nothing creepy about this somewhat bothersome poltergeist, nor is it meant to be; if the cardigan unites Pablo with a larger continuum of contacts, the ghost, in an even less corporeal way, links him to his psyche. Could the film’s message be that even if our inner self wanders away for a time it always comes back to haunt us? Perhaps. Will viewers be debating this question more than a day after watching Phantom Project? Unlikely.
Pablo’s sweetly mischievous smile and genuinely nice guy approach to life accrue him a tight group of queer and straight friends from the neighborhood, ever-ready to provide an ear and emotional support. The circle includes gardening YouTuber Tere (Rocío Monasterio), who brings rue plants to ward against bad energy, and singer Sofia (Violeta Castillo, star of Las Plantas), a new acquaintance who ends up temporarily transporting the ghost to Argentina. There’s also his downstairs neighbor Ana (Natalia Grez), whose connection to Pablo, cemented by his sympathetic energy when she’s dealing with a verbally abusive boyfriend, increases our appreciation for his overall kindness.
It’s a minor element in a film built entirely from minor elements, and it’s a testament to the way Doveris conveys his own warmth for these characters that it holds together, more or less. Not quite so emotionally integrated is the inclusion of Jorge (Claudio González Ravanal), the head guru at a Holistic Center whose screen time doesn’t really connect to the others except as a slight link enabling the ghost’s La Ronde peregrinations. There’s no sense of critique, either outright or implied, of the world of influencers and YouTubers, but perhaps that’s a generational thing, and in the present climate of beauty tutorials and self-affirmation, their presence in peoples’ lives, both virtual and real, is unremarkable. Classical music, from Tchaikovsky to Grieg, is nicely interpolated throughout.
Director: Roberto Doveris
Screenplay: Roberto Doveris
Cast: Juan Cano, Ingrid Isensee, Violeta Castillo, Fernando Castillo, Ernesto Meléndez, Fernanda Toledo, Yasmín Ludueñas, Natalia Grez, Claudio González Ravanal, Marco Carmona, Rocío Monasterio, Constanza Fernández, Cristóbal Venegas, María Ignacia Larrondo, Sofía Oportot, Paloma Larraín
Producers: Roberto Doveris, Aura Sinclair
Cinematography: Patricio Alfaro
Production design: Constian de la Rosa
Editing: Sylvana Squicciarini
Sound: Cristián Verdugo, Mauricio Flores Roig
Production company: Niña Niño Films (Chile), Agencia Rekia (Chile)
World sales: Patra Spanou Film
Venue: Rotterdam International Film Festival (Tiger Competition)
In Spanish
97 minutes
