I can't help but think to myself that writer/director Nicola Rose's Freestyle Digital Media release Magnetosphere should have failed. 

It's a weird story. It's a weird film. It's got weird characters and, I'm guessing, pretty weird actors to portray those characters. 

If I were to further guess, despite looking rather normal it's highly like that Nicola Rose herself is weird. 

To work, Magnetosphere required a strange array of cinematic ingredients including humor that laughs with and not at its characters, heart that feels honest without ever crossing the line into maudlin, and an absolute belief in the idea that being weird is okay. 

Oh, and there's one more huge factor here. While a film's cast always matters, the simple truth is that without the perfect ensemble Magnetosphere would never have worked. 

Magnetosphere works gloriously. 

It starts with Shayelin Martin. A relative newcomer, at least to major roles, Martin gives a stunningly insightful and intuitive performance as 13-year-old Maggie. Maggie is a delightful young teen who doesn't quite realize she's delightful. Living in a dynamic all-sensory world where sounds burst into colors and images become melodies, Maggie weirdness is isolating until she learns it has a name, synesthesia, and she begins to discover a world where she doesn't have to hide this wild and wondrous way that she experiences the world. It seems weird to call Magnetosphere a coming-of-age story because, quite honestly, it's so much more. Maggie begins to find a home in her father's incredibly eccentric theater production. She finds a teacher who "gets" her and friends who celebrate her unique gifts. 

Magnetosphere absolutely could not have worked without Shayelin Martin making us believe in this world and in this teenager's life experiences. Martin draws us in and commands our attention throughout, not in a way that dominates but in a way that immerses us. For those of us, myself included, who came of age perhaps a little differently than everyone else, Magnetosphere is a breath of fresh air with an almost magical world filled to the brim with an inspired combination of weird and wonderful, real-life and a surprisingly poignant innocence. It's a film I loved from beginning to end and a lot of that love is due to Martin's touching, funny, and honest performance. 

To her credit, Rose never suffocates us with Maggie's weirdness. Maggie lives with her parents (Patrick McKenna, Tania Webb) and sister (Zooey Schneider), an environment itself that is more than a little weird. A relocation challenges Maggie, who's become convinced she's too different to ever fit in. 

Every little triumph that Maggie has feels glorious. Every joy. Every connection. Every moment of love. Every single time she inches closer toward discovering the wonder that she is, you can't help but smile and whisper toward the screen "Keep going!" 

Magnetosphere is about synesthesia, sure, but it's really not. It's about those of us who live life differently or weirdly or feeling like we're outsiders until we discover that maybe we're not. It's a coming-of-age story for weirdos, maybe a bit of a distant cousin to 1995's criminally underrated teen comedy Angus. It's about friendship and love, community and both fitting in and standing out. 

Synesthesia is real. Rose makes sure we understand its sensory and experiential spectrum. It can be amazing, yeah, but it can also be overwhelming and disorienting and so much more. Again, Rose wisely avoids going overly dramatic or sickeningly maudlin. We laugh. We never laugh at the expense of the characters. Rose never hits a false note here, though I'll confess I worried about it when Maggie takes to crushing on Travis (Steven He), an older male in her father's musical production whose response to Maggie is pitch-perfect with life lessons to follow. I was also excited to see Whose Line Is It Anyway's? Colin Mochrie here as Gil, a handyman with increasingly funny yet emotionally resonant gifts. If you've ever seen Mochrie on Whose Line Is It Anyway?, you already know he's sublimely cast here (if, perhaps, a bit under-utilized). Improv practically commands a weaving together of real-life and the fantastic - and that's perfect for Mochrie's Gil. 

If you're like me, and you're probably not because I'm a major weirdo, you probably have those times when you look at a film and think to yourself "How did that end up in a multiplex?" Or "How is that not playing in theaters everywhere?" I think we all know by now that these small indie flicks find their home on the festival circuit before ending up an indie distributor for a digital release and, on occasion, a limited theatrical release. Magnetosphere is one of those little gems that works precisely because its weirdness is wonderful instead of being weird for the sake of being weird.

It feels truthful. 

Rose gets it. The ensemble gets it. The production crew gets it. We get it. 

Lensing by Mathieu Taillefer is inspired, a beautiful combination of immersive weirdness and luxurious humanity. Matthew Reid's original score amplifies the film's emotional rhythms and narrative honesty. Janessa Hitsman's production desin enhances our immersion in this world and finds the perfect balance of reality and fantasy. 

I get it. Really. Some of you, if we're being honest, aren't going to care for Magnetosphere. I'm not sure you normies are going to get it, however, for the rest of us this feels like a safe place to call our cinematic home. You'll fall in love with Maggie and you'll fall in love with this village she discovers that reminds her that you're never too weird to be loved. 

But, you are weird. 

Written by Richard Propes
The Independent Critic