The cuts, as we switch from inside the freezer to the world outside are inspired. It also works from the outside as an unlikely group of people come together to find the missing girl. It transforms into a survival drama that works in two ways first from the inside with Helen trying to survive the night, as it plummets to minus 17 degrees. Just to be clear, the film’s about how Helen, who works in a KFC-like fast food joint, gets stuck in the freezer after working a late shift. This seems like just another line, but later, when the two go to the theatre for a movie, Paul takes a seat, looks up and says ‘cooling pora’. Like how on a routine scooter ride, Paul (Lal) jokes to his daughter about how he lost his fair complexion working under the extremely hot sun of the Middle East. The detailing too is exceptional in a way that almost every casual scene or dialogue fits into the film’s larger design. It’s just two extra seconds during the setup, but its payoff later on feels so rewarding because of this. But as she goes there, we see how she not only knows the name of the lady who collects garbage but that Helen also noticed how she’s wearing a new set of earrings. When we first meet Helen (an excellent Anna Ben) we see how her daily routine includes her walking over to her neighbour’s house to give injections and medicines to the elderly lady there. It’s the same with a lot of the little things the film plants early on. The film protects the redundancy in such scenes by masking it with some clever comic writing but when you notice how the cigarette and the lighter makes a return later on, you’re amazed at what the writers have already established. In a father-daughter relationship movie, it can seem like a cliché to be repeatedly shown scenes of the daughter chiding the father for smoking secretly. For instance, notice how cleverly the film uses the trope of the father smoking. The film’s first twenty minutes or so are so good that it feels like the screenwriters are using this time to scatter seeds all throughout, only for it to grow into trees as we reach the film’s third act. Film students and aspiring writers may study Helen to understand how astutely it uses the dramatic principle known as the Chekhov’s Gun.
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