Film: Rock Garden: A Love Story
Studio: 28 Pictures / Gloryous Films
Principal actors: Irving Dobbs and Vladimir Milman
Director: Gloria Kim
Film Length: 9 minutes
Rating: Unrated 

Reviewed By: Rodrigo Toromoreno (Toronto Correspondent - Canada) 

To immerse a viewer within a distant world has almost become a property of contemporary films by default due to the visual effects achievable today. However, without an equal attempt to engross the audience through the film's narrative, the viewer emerges from this realm impressed by the visuals while the story itself assumes a secondary position to the former. It is not the intention of this reviewer to argue the merits or deficiencies of the hackneyed issue regarding ‘style over substance' (as this can only be done productively in reference to individual films rather than resorting to rash generalizations); instead, the matter in question becomes whether aesthetics and content can jointly be treated as ‘means', rather than ‘ends' to the film in its totality. In the case of Rock Garden: A Love Story the answer is an emphatic yes.

Beginning with its peculiar title, Gloria Kim's work establishes its unique tone long before the first luscious frame unfolds onscreen. The love story alluded to in the title centres around two farmers who cultivate rocks. Farmer Ugg is the more successful of the two and this incites the competitive impulse that drives his neighbour, farmer Merr, to grow his own rocks. However, after finding a small red flower in his field one morning, Farmer Ugg soon decides to become a horticulturalist and along with this change in interest comes a change in gender for the protagonist. Farmer Merr discovers a newfound attraction in his rival's physical metamorphosis as the tale of enmity slowly dissolves into the titular love story. The aforementioned title joins two disparate concepts (love and minerals) in a manner similar to the way Kim joins filmic components that are customarily polarized via the film's authentic tone.  

Structured like a modern fairytale, Rock Garden: A Love Story uses a tone akin more to Charles Perrault's jocose stories than the post-expressionistic works of Tim Burton where the image is king. Kim's remarkable director of photography (Joshua Allen) rids his images of an ostentatious pretension by having the story dictate the style of each frame; this in turn generates a playful dynamic between the narrative and the visuals which help define the general ambience. For example, the brown and yellow world prominent during the first part of the film only receives an infusion of red and orange once Farmer Ugg begins his transformation. During her phone interview, Sandra Paolucci, Rock Garden's passionate producer, comments on the importance of Allen's ability to collaborate style with story. "We needed someone who could visually express emotion because, for the most part, it is a silent film". It is a credit to the effectiveness of this objective when, as a viewer, the absence of dialogue goes unperceived the entire nine minutes. During the only moment that the silence is broken, in which Farmer Ugg hums a single note, the sound blends into the into the "subtle and playful" soundtrack. Paolucci states that this was intentional on the part of musician Roselind Mills, proving once again that even at a literal level Rock Garden's elements blend to generate an original film.

Furthermore, Kim's love story based on gender reversal masterfully revitalizes the fundamental-albeit frequently ignored-aspect of the fable when transformation is depicted as a process that is at once natural and magical; what results is a harmonized film that is as literate as it is playful in the tradition of Ovid's fables. From the soundtrack and cinematography to the narrative and the performances, no single element in the film mutes the other as they play an equal role in mesmerizing the viewer with a film that strengthens the repertoire of Canadian films.