Hypnotised and Hysterical

This belated first feature from short-film-maker Duty is a genuinely offbeat pop musical. Its allegiance to the Demy tradition is to be found not in the slightly uninspired sub-Madonna choreography and melodies (albeit with agreeably witty lyrics), but in the clever colour coding (lurid rather than pastel) and in the unusually downbeat story about three young women going through various crises. (One's an alky who lost her pussy, another a single 'unfit' mother, the last obsessed with vengeance on her faithless lover.) Then there's the animated and synchronised-swimming sequences, a finale tinged (tongue-in-cheek) with pantheistic mysticism, and an engagingly diverse array of minor characters (including a Masai warrior). Quite delightfully different.