Lightbulb (Jeffrey Balsmeyer, 2009): U.S.

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy. Viewed at the Santa Barbara Film Festival.

The closing night film at the SBIFF was humorous, uplifting and a biopic.   Lightbulb  is based on the life of local Santa Barbaran and writer of the film, Mike Cram.

Matt is not a genius, but he is an inventor of gadgets. His latest gadget is a “lottery wristwatch” that selects winning numbers for the owner. Do you see the problem? It’s a hair-brained idea and of course it doesn’t sell. Gina is Matt’s loving and extremely patient wife, who supports him both emotionally and financially.

Enter Sam, best friend of Matt and negative influence. Sam is a border-line sleazy salesman type that likes to gamble. Matt thinks nothing of asking his hard-working wife to take out a loan in order to finance his next idea, and then proceeds to gamble the money away. As Matt’s debt soars, Gina’s respect for him falters.

There are many humorous antics between Matt and Sam, i.e. Sam spots a dog taking a crap at the dog races, he concludes that’s the winning dog – since the dog will be lighter on his feet, naturally they put all of their money on the dog, and it loses. Some of Matt’s inventions are absolutely ridiculous too. There are problems with the T.V. viewing hat – the wearer focuses on the small screen T.V. attached to his hat and fails to see what’s in front of him. The main problem with the remote control beer mug? Well, when you point the remote at the T.V. the entire contents of the mug spills on your lap.

Gina reaches her boiling point and leaves, forcing Matt to finally buckle down and get a 9–5er. At last Matt comes up with a bright idea, he makes a prototype, and it’s a hit – the talking bottle opener! This film is well-made, coherent and quirky, with good actors to boot. Sorry, no fan-fare on the part of the filmmaker – Jeffrey Balsmeyer (Danny Deckchair), just good solid continuity. The film stars Dallas Roberts (Matt) from Walk the Line (James Mangold, 2005), Jeremy Renner (Sam) from The Assassination of Jesse James (Andrew Dominik, 2007), and Ayelet Zurer (Gina) – you might remember her from Pete Travis’ Vantage Point (2008). The film is set in the beautiful Tucson desert.