January 26, 1999

Treasure Island



'Treasure Island' Park City Utah - "Treasure Island" is an abundance of gifted flimmaking, an enigmatic and experimental motion picture prism likely to illuminate and confound viewers. One of the more accomplished and inventive entries in the dramatic competition at the Sundance Film Festival, the film is a work of superior craftsmanship and cinematic daring. Filmmaker Scott King is surely one of the festival's talents to be discovered.

Using an actual World War II situation as a starting point' 'Treasure Island" emanates around two U.S. intelligence officers and their cryptography work on the fictional post of Treasure Island in the South Pacific. The duo, Frank (Lance Baker) and Samuel (Nick Offerman), are writers charged with the task of creating a fictional identity for a corpse the Navy will dump on a battlefield for Japanese intelligence to find. Their job is to create a personality for this John Doe soldier, filling his pockets with letters from home and similar items. These are red herrings, designed to trick the enemy into thinking they have uncovered secret U.S. intelligence.

Via flashbacks as well as lacing in a surreal look at the personal lives of the two intelligence officers, writer-director-cinematographer King has spun a deeper tale than the surface plot itself. 'Treasure Island" is a thematic maelstrom: National prejudices, personal urges and deep-down compulsions are decoded. Admittedly, King's distanced storytelling and cool flourishes are at times baffling - in the jargon of the plot, cryptic - but overall, his surreal storytelling congeals into a complex and fathomable picture.

The performances are splendid, especially Baker as cerebral but wily Frank. Baker's scissor-sharp mannerisms and piercing delivery are highly effective in his role of writer-cryptologist As his somewhat dull colleague, Offerman is similarly effective. His blunt style is perfect for a character whose obviousness is contradictory to his inner reality: His is a brainy performance showing a character's inner layer through behavior that belies it.

Technical contributions are accomplished, including King's smartly positioned character framings and production designer Nathan Marsak's shrewd minimalist revelations. Composer Chris Anderson's eerie sounds are aptly disquieting and nervy, getting below the surface of things