Post Concussion (1999)

Man this is like the definition "low-budget, self-made indie film". When successful business consultant Daniel Yoon was hit by a car and got a serious concussion, he spent months in recovery suffering from memory loss, alternative medicine, and a total shift of priorities. He also wrote several screenplays and taught himself about filmmaking from books. One of those screenplays was for Post Concussion, which he made into a movie over a long period of time with himself and his friend Destry Miller as the main actors, camera crew, directors, producers, and editors. It is a pretty impressive feat. The film is narrated by and stars Yoon as Matthew Kang, following his life right before and for several months after the accident. We see him as a withdrawn yuppie living in Berkley, CA, unwilling to form meaningful connections with anyone around him.

His girlfriend Christina (Niloufar Talebi) is a bullshitting freeloader. His boss Francis (Michael Hohmeyer) is an unapologetic asshole. His mother (played by Yoon's real mother CB Yoon) is a worrisome and lonely Korean immigrant living in NJ. After the accident Matthew is pretty much left to his own devices, abandoned by Christina and unable to go back to his job. He experiments with spiritual healing but sees through the manipulations of cult leader Gabriel (Destry Miller). He confuses television with reality and has some short-term memory problems. His new downstairs neighbor Monika (Jennifer Welch), a student from Germany, reaches out to him and helps him come out of his malaise and start enjoying life simply.

This was just a really enjoyable, interesting film. It dealt with some serious issues, but in a funny and sympathetic way. The performances were great, especially considering most of the actors had never done film before and Daniel Yoon himself had never acted. I loved Jennifer Welch especially- so adorable! And German! The story was fairly simple but well-rounded with lots of good characters and little cutaway scenes about the nature of the brain (also starring Destry Miller) and various TV spots (also starring Destry Miller). He sprinkled in some insight into his background and relationship with his mother, without getting sappy. The relationship between Matthew and Monika was very sweet and well-portrayed. The subject itself was something I didn't know/hadn't thought much about so I was really engaged just by Matthew's situation.

One weird thing about the movie is that though it's set probably in the late 90's, the computers and cell phones look like they're from 1988. It's weird. Like where did they find this stuff? And the overall quality is way grainy, like a low quality VHS, which is interesting. Also, what happened to these people after they made this movie? Daniel Yoon disappeared, maybe. Anyway it's a good film, and available on Netflix surprisingly. More information about its development can be found here.

4/5