One Hour Photo

A fine movie by Mark Romanek, who previously worked a lot on videoclips. He made the clips of ‘Closer’ and ‘The Perfect Drug’ for Nine Inch Nails, amongst others. The story tells about Sy the Photoguy (Robin Williams). Sy is employee of a large company called the Savemarket. For many years now he works at their one-hour photo developing lab. One day he meets the Yorkin family, who have many of their photos developed there. Sy is getting an obsessive interest in this family. He makes double prints of their photos, so he can hang them at home. He starts to see himself as the protector and family friend of Nina and Jake Yorkin (mother and son). Naturally he is shocked when he develops photos which show that father Yorkin is having a secret affair with one of Sy’s other customers. Meanwhile Savemarket notices that Sy is making too many costs, and they keep a sharp eye on him…

The film is wonderfully designed, you can see that clip directors are strong at settings and the visual side. ‘One Hour Photo’ buils up slowly to a thrilling predictable and unavoidable climax. Robin Williams plays a particularly strong role as Sy, he plays the slightly pathetic guy in a very refrained manner, making you get some pity besides contempt for the poor guy.