Poison

I've seen a couple of Todd Haynes' films already, all of them interesting in their own right, so I wasn't really surprised to see his very first feature was a bit oddball too. I'm not his biggest fan, but the man has some intriguing ideas about cinema, and even though Poison wasn't particularly great, it reinforces Haynes' reputation as a director with a unique vision.

The film is an anthology with three different stories cut up and shown alongside each other. In the first one a young boy murders his father, the second one follows a leper as he infects everyone he meets, the third and final short film is about a gay romance that develops in a prison cell.

Each short has a very distinct style (from faux-doc and classic horror to gritty drama), but I wasn't entirely sold on the structure of the film. I'm sure the hope was that these stories would somehow link together, but that never truly materialized. It makes for a somewhat messy film, but still interesting enough to give it a try.