Sweet and Short: Marrow (Dir. Jay T. Grimes)

Here is our next edition of Sweet and Short. To make sure you never miss a review on your potential new favourite filmmaker, be sure to sign up to our Newsletter!

Marrow is a sharp depiction of psychological collapse, showing a dark understanding of the state of an unhealed mind.  The narrative follows a young paramedic on an emergency call. Her fear of ageing and death affects her work and causes the audience to reflect on the effects of unresolved trauma. 

Mainly set during the course of a single emergency call, the short blends clinical realism with increasingly surreal imagery. Cranleigh, playing Alexis, the young paramedic, gives an impressive picture of a woman teetering on the edge of professional competence and personal despair. Their violent performance is raw and desperate, and is highly complemented by the use of underlighting and colouring. 

Alexis commits this violent act after the panic of seeing her own hand aged, desperately trying to rub the age off of her own skin. She takes her fear out on an elderly woman. How the film is edited makes you question her motives. Is this a want in her head? A violent retaliation. To react forcefully against her own fear of ageing. Or is it a fear itself to the extent she may go to stop the ageing process. Is she living the notion some have of wishing to be dead rather than live to be that old? Is this a metaphorical visual? Are we exploring the lengths the human mind can go or literally visualising the physical side effects of psychological collapse? I enjoyed the open-endedness of these questions. Alexis seems off and distressed by the end of the film, but not entirely undone by the act she has supposedly committed. 

It is like the director wanted to explore how dark the audience’s mind would go, and I am here for it. Whether you think, ‘God no, she would never do that. Surely it’s in her head.’, or perhaps only question how far your fear can bring you, ‘What a pity it got far enough that she hurt someone instead of getting help’, really is up to you and your own mindset. It feels interactive and cold. 

What makes Marrow stand out is not just its subject matter (fear of ageing is rarely portrayed with this kind of visceral immediacy or violence) but its style. The cinematography is stark and hazy at once. It is dreamlike but also highly alert. Like a drunk person trying to sober up, things half stark and clear yet so confusing, or like living a panic attack. Like I said, stark and hazy all at once. That being said, the film never loses narrative clarity. Every frame feels like a step deeper into a rabbit hole that’s both terrifying and deeply human.

Something that got my attention is how the director chose to show violence. Rather than relying on a spectacle, Marrow shows strong technique, leaning on atmosphere and tightly edited sequences to build tension. Violence shocks innately, yet this film’s shock is built, not relying on the grotesqueness of hurting a vulnerable person, nor does it sensationalise the violence by depicting it in victim-focused shots. That’s kudos to you in my books. 

Marrow is striking, sophisticated, tense, intelligent, and emotionally raw. I’d recommend the techniques be followed closely by those looking to further their craft, and the film be watched with an open mind by those who simply wish to view and feel.