High Maintenance (Von, 2006)
High Maintenance is the story in the near future, were a woman whose robotic husband fails to meet her standards returns and upgrades him for a better version with standards that she now fails to meet.
Genre codes:
Phillip Von’s 2006 short film High Maintenance is a sci-fi fil to its core. At the beginning of the film spectators believe they are watching a couple (who are far from love) sharing an awkward & uncomfortable anniversary dinner. This is conveyed through the man in the scene not drinking and the woman’s attempt of flirting & heating up the conversation being stalely shut down by the man. This results in the woman snapping, throwing a wine glass & insulting the mans ‘mechanical’ (foreshadowing) performance in bed. As he responds by lighting a cigarette to the woman’s distain. We then see her apologise and try to comfort the man while slowly reaching for a switch at the back of his neck, this is revealed by an extreme close up. This reveal is Von’s first explicit revelation of the film being within the realm of the Sci-fi genre. This is then further conveyed by an extreme close up of new technology being the earpiece the woman used to order her next man. This is typical in Sci-fi films as films within this genre often challenge audiences’ expectation of realism & possibilities of society rapidly advancing technology. Another gene code that High Maintenance displays is that the film serves as a mirror reflecting cultural concerns. Cultural concerns Von may be discussing/mirroring is dating app culture that was beginning to become popular in the mid-2000s. Von’s fear of the commercialisation of dating and love may be being reflected by the website (Prometeus Robotics) in which the woman designs her new man & the fast delivery in which he arrives. This is also further conveyed with the tag line of the website ‘Chose Everlasting Love’. This is ironic as the woman’s first ‘attempt’ at everlasting love was a failure and so she is designing her next ‘attempt’. A final genre code is the theme of humanity & identity which is often throughout the Sci-fi genre. The female who we eventually discover to also be a robot appears to be more ‘natural’ behaving and spectators believe her to be a human until the twist at the end of the film. This makes the audience question why the woman was able to be more emotional compared to her male counterparts who were bland and almost share the same identity (smoking & very similar dialogue) however still having slight differences.
Narrative:
High Maintenance is a linear narrative. This makes the film easy to follow for spectators which makes the twist at the end more effective as spectators can properly focus on the film. However with use of the twist and other questions spectators can ask it keeps audiences engaged and waiting for what happens next. Many binary oppositions are shown throughout the film with woman vs man in the opening scenes with the argument and overall, audiences believing Human vs Android (however, spectators eventually find out she is also an android). Furthermore, Von uses action codes such as the argument to make the woman eventually turn man 1 off resulting in her looking for a replacement for him. The twist at the end also implies that this type of cycle may have happened for a long time in the past (or will happen for a long time into the future) of one getting tired of the traits of the other, order a new model only to be seen as unsatisfying to the new version and to then be replaced, thus continuing the cycle (something implied by the dialogue in the opening and closing scenes mirroring each other).
Mise-en-Scene:
Opening shots of the couple display them sitting opposite one another on a long table. This reflects the couple relationship being strained, and an emotional distance to one another as they are physically far apart. However with the eventual reveal of the man being a robot spectators may feel a sense of forces, natural love. This can be conveyed with the candles on the table to celebrate the ‘anniversary’ that the audience eventually discovers isn’t real as she celebrates the same ‘anniversary’ with man 2, who she had known for a few hours. The futuristic setting is conveyed by props such as the earpiece the woman wears when ordering her new husband. This prop, along with others (android husbands), allow Von to set the scene and the futuristic setting allowing spectators to expect things far from reality as this film is set in the future and technology has developed at a rapid speed. The wedding ring reflects the meaningless nature of the relationship due to the ring being passed on from man 1 to man 2. Spectators also learn the woman is designing man 2 based of her actual husband (who audiences can only speculate what happened to him – did he leave her because she is too high maintenance?), spectators learn this from a shot of a picture of them on their wedding day. This further reflects the meaningless of the marriage as she is looking for a man who will replace the feeling she has lost however, she is doing this by trying to manufacture natural human feeling. By placing a ring on a man’s finger, he will not become the ideal partner for her. Other factors of mise-en-scene help link the two men but show their differences. For example both men smoke, man 1 doesn’t drink but man 2 does. This shows the similarities of both as they both come from the same factory and have similar defaults, but differences still occur as they have some unique characteristics.
Editing:
Von uses fast cuts throughout the film in order to create a sense of urgency & to convey how efficient technology has become and the futuristic setting of the film. This is presented through the fast cut between the woman ordering man 2 and his delivery right at her front door. Furthermore, cuts between taking the ring off man 1 & putting ring on man 2 conveys the woman’s urgency to resume her anniversary dinner, and her desperation to have the perfect partner to share her anniversary with. The fast switch of husband also conveys forced love again as she is trying to ignore the change and continue the feelings for her first man to the second man.
Cinematography:
Close ups are used by Von to convey emotion (or the lack of emotion) in characters faces. The mix of close ups and extreme close ups creates a tone of un-comfortability in spectators and a sense of awkwardness in scenes. In the scene of the first anniversary dinner, Von uses over the shoulder shots to help make spectators feel more involved in the dinner & conversation. However, as the dinner begins to go down hill and an argument ensues we begin to see medium shot of characters and very rarely see them share the same frame reflecting the further separation between the couple.
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