From Omeleto.
A man is forced to leave a review.
PUSHOVER is used with permission from Brian Lederman. Learn more at https://brianlederman.com.
Aaron ordered a hand-blown glass paperweight online some time ago. One day at work, he gets a phone call. It’s from the paperweight company, following up on his purchase and wanting to know if he’s satisfied. After hearing Aaron is satisfied, the seller demands that Aaron leave a review.
Aaron tries to fob him off, but the calling persists. The phone conversation takes a surreal twist, as Aaron discovers more about the nature of the product he bought.
Directed and written by Brian Lederman, this quirky yet ominous short comedy is less about LOL-worthy laughs and more about a thought-provoking absurdity, pulling the curtain back on the dystopian knot of interconnection woven by our economic systems. One man’s simple purchase of a seemingly throwaway object unveils the more sinister process that produced it, as well as the high stakes that are tied to its success. The conceit of the story — a man gets a phone call demanding he leave a review for something he bought online — is played as high-concept and absurdist. But the archly intelligent writing uses its preposterousness to develop a pointed metaphor about profit, labor and the invisible fist of modern capitalism.
The deft, briskly-paced storytelling situates Aaron in his office cubicle, a small, mild-mannered cog in a hive of activity and business. Shot with a fluid camera in cool, antiseptic light and colors befitting the alienating work environment, there’s little personality in the office, except for Aaron’s paperweight, which shows the tiny figure of a man trapped in the glass in an eternal posture of suspended helplessness. But the uncanny hush of the office is interrupted by the insistent calls Aaron gets from the paperweight company.
First, they ask about Aaron’s experience with the product, and then they demand that he leave a review, the tenor of the conversation shifting from benign customer service to faintly dangerous and threatening. Startled, Aaron hangs up, but the phone calls persist, eventually revealing the strange truth behind his paperweight, how it’s made and what will happen if the seller doesn’t receive the right feedback. Actor Josh Tobin gives a grounded, understated performance of a meek and flustered office worker who snaps as he fights with the seller, which anchors us as the film’s tone grows increasingly strange and unsettling. Soon Josh and viewers are surprised and horrified at what he discovers, in a reveal of just how the paperweight is made and why the seller is so desperate for it to succeed.
That revelation, along with a memorably weird final scene, ends PUSHOVER on an uneasy, weird note, and perhaps makes it akin to contemporary films and series like SEVERANCE or BLACK MIRROR that examine the larger economic and political systems that shape our lives through invisible but overarching pressures. It also guarantees we’ll never look at even the most throwaway objects we buy and accumulate in quite the same way again, made as they are by people whose livelihoods and circumstances could be more desperate than our own — and who we often judge as the enemy, when we’re all just trying to stay afloat in a dysfunctional system.
