If we’re to quote Morrissey, ”there is a light that never goes out”, we would say that in ‘Fix’, the light feels like the wind of change that is slowly approaching. Willem, played by Dan Flannery, is packing his belongings to move out of the house. This process makes him sad and, at the same time, brings back memories that are long gone. Whilst packing, he sees that one of the lightbulbs flashes oddly and suddenly becomes obsessed with this. When his daughter Patricia, played by Cameron Feagin, comes to see how he is doing, she finds out that her father went down on memory lane and forgot to pack. He finds a book of random curiosities and starts citing from it, suddenly becoming a man who avoids confrontation with life itself. The whole lightbulb story continues, and at some point, Willem proceeds to do something and plans to repair the socket. The story then unveils the motif of Willem’s stalling and the root of his sadness.
In ‘Fix’, Kevin Orzel focuses on creating a deep feeling to get the viewer hooked on the story right from the start. That feeling is represented by the desire of expanding time to postpone facing reality. Willem tries to find activities to be engaged in only to hesitate when it comes to facing the harsh reality life offers. He starts reading a book of random facts, citing it afterwards; he gets obsessed with the lightbulb flashing in the bedroom, a lightbulb that is also an important symbol in the whole story scheme. The lightbulb is, therefore, the critical element in this narrative. When Willem proceeds to repair the lightbulb, he tries to fix the past in order for the future to be bright and shiny. He is willing to risk it all, only to make things go back to the way he once knew them.
When Willem falls from the chair, reality strucks, and right at that moment, he understands that nothing could alter the past or future. He has to embrace life as it is, while also facing the pain that is always round the corner. Dan Flannery is impeccable in delivering the right amount of hope and sadness to the viewer, becoming, in the end, the Phoenix that rises from its own ashes.
Written by Vlad A. G