Nina Forever

Plot synopsis:
We open with a man splayed out on the road, seemingly dead. His motorcycle is crashed a few feet away from him, smoking and beeping. Just when it appears that the man is dead, he comes to and moves.We cut to a supermarket parking lot, where Holly (Abigail Hardingham) is discussing the accident with some of her co-workers, and the man who had it, Rob (Cian Barry), who is a fellow employee. Rob had apparently caused the accident on purpose to commit suicide, despondent over the death of girlfriend Nina (Fiona O'Shaughnessy). Holly finds his actions endearing and sweet. "I'd love it if my boyfriend tried to kill himself because I died", she says.Her co-workers tell her that Rob failed in his attempt though and now he is stocking shelves for minimum wage. "Imagine being fucked by someone like that", Holly says, equating Rob's damaged psyche with sexual prowess. Her coworkers say she is weird and that she doesn't actually want to sleep with him, she just wants to be there when he finally succeeds in killing himself. They tell her she can't save him before going back to work. As they leave, Holly hears them snicker about the fact that despite being enamored with Rob, she has yet to speak to him.That night, Holly is in a car with her boyfriend, David, who is breaking up with her. David awkwardly asks to be friends, and Holly agrees at first. David then notes that perhaps he was too dark for her. When Holly inquires what he meant, David says that he considered her vanilla due to her being so nice. He immediately tries to backpedal, telling her that isn't a bad thing. Holly tells him to go fuck himself and leaves the car, saying he knows nothing about her.The next day, Holly is at work, ringing up customers' purchases while she watches Rob stock the shelves. At one point, Rob breaks a jar and cuts his arm, screaming an obscenity. His boss asks if he is okay and he storms off to the break room.Later, Holly goes back to the stock room and sees Rob sitting on a shelf listening to music. She gets his attention and asks to see his cut, as she is a paramedic in training. She takes a look at it, and Rob goes back to listening to his music. Holly asks what he is listening to, so he offers an ear bud and she listens with him. As she listens, Rob looks at her and for the first time notices her beauty. Holly grabs a pomegranate and tears it in half for Rob and her to share. As she digs into the fruit, Rob looks at her intently.At home that night, Holly cant sleep. She gets a text from an unknown number. It says "I really wish I'd kissed you." Holly smiles, realizing it was Rob that sent the text, and goes back to sleep.Rob and Holly go on a date. They seem for a minute ready to kiss. Rob then asks her why she spoke to him. Everyone else at work think of him as this fragile freak that is ready to kill himself. Holly notes that he does a pretty good impression of that stereotype. Rob smirks then walks off the sidewalk near traffic. Holly tenses, thinking Rob was going to try and kill himself with an audience. However, all he was doing was taking a shortcut across the street to get to the theater they are going to. After some convincing, Holly runs across and joins him, taking his hand when she reaches safety. Rob notices her action and they both smile.The next day, Holly thinks about the night before. Rob told her he didn't want to hurt her. Holly tells him he won't.Holly goes to one her paramedic classes where the instructor briefs them about what it means to be a paramedic. Intercut with the speech is Holly trying on her outfit at home for her next date with Rob. We see her in his apartment, taking off her clothes. The instructor concludes his speech saying that distance is one of the most important things to have in their line of work, as they must understand that they will not be able to save everyone.That night at Rob's apartment, they put on some music and drink a glass of wine. As they look at each other, Rob moves to kiss her, causing Holly to spill some wine. She apologizes then breaks the glass and laughs.We see a close up of Rob's bed. A small red dot on the pillow slowly becomes larger.Rob and Holly begin to undress and they move to the bedroom where they begin to have passionate sex. We see Rob has a tattoo on his back that says Nina Forever. As they continue to have sex, blood begins to seep into the mattress and sheets around them. A bloody hand crawls out from underneath the covers. Bloody hands grab Holly's feet. She thinks they are Rob's but they have their hands clasped together. They realize something is horribly wrong.Blood continues to soak the sheets and a body forms out of the bed, startling both Holly and Rob. It is a naked Nina, broken and bloody as she was on the day her car accident took her life. Nina is less than pleased to find a naked woman in her boyfriend's bed, despite the fact that she is no longer among the living. Rob introduces them to each other, and notes Holly works with him at the supermarket."How old is she, really?" Nina asks as her body contorts, barely able to stand or sit up due to her injuries. Rob replies that this isn't possible, that she is dead. "Yeah, but I kept my standards", Nina deadpans. During this time, Holly watches with shock, unable to comprehend what is happening. She believes Nina to be a hallucination, but when she goes to touch her, Nina slaps her hard across the face. Nina says she is Rob's girlfriend, and because they didn't break up before she died, she is technically not an ex. She orders Holly to get the fuck out of her room, and she cuddles up to Rob who says he doesn't want this. But Nina sweet talks and seduces him, leading him to kiss her as Holly watches. Holly goes back into the living room to collect her clothes in disgust. As Rob goes to her, naked and covered in Nina's blood, Holly runs out of the apartment. Rob turns around to look at the bloodied bed, but Nina is gone. "Fuck!", Rob says.The next day, Holly is at home, trying to process what happened. She bandages a cut she got stepping on a piece of glass and looks up Nina's obituary, that says she died after losing control of her car and was pronounced dead at the scene.Holly is at her classes but cannot concentrate on her studies. She gets a text from Rob saying she doesn't have to see him again and thanks her for trying to get through his depressive fog. Her coworkers snidely ask how her relationship is going with the suicidal stock boy and asks if his dead girlfriend has come up. Holly says it was mentioned then walks off, disgusted with their callous attitude.Rob is in his apartment, wrapped up in a blanket and curled up in a ball on his couch. He gets up to look up at the bed that is still covered in blood. He laughs nervously, trying to figure out an explanation for what happened, but finding none. Somehow, some way, Nina came back. Rob then proceeds to clean up the glass and all the blood. He takes off the bloody sheets and flips the mattress to the non-bloody side. He sees the blood trail caused by Holly's wound and cleans it up with a mop. He then takes the sheets to the laundry but realizing what it would look like, he trashes them and buys new ones.At the cemetery, he checks his phone for messages from Holly, finding none. In the car, he is spoken to by a woman, who is later revealed to be Nina's mother. She asks if he has found someone else to love. She tells Rob that if he hasn't it is okay, but if he has it is also okay to move on, that they all have to move on. Unsure of his status with Holly, unable to explain what happened the night before, and not wanting to hurt a woman he considers family, Rob tells her no. Nina's mother then tends to her daughter's grave.We cut the house of Nina's parents. Rob apparently still has dinner with them often. Nina's father is a bit unnerved that he still comes around so much, but tries to be as sympathetic as possible, knowing all three of them are in pain over losing someone they all loved. Over dinner, they ask him awkward questions about restarting his schooling and his motorcycle. Later, Rob and Nina's father read over the latest chapter of the dads book and asks Rob to read it, even though Rob can tell it is terrible. He does it because he wants to feel close to Nina still. Nina's father tries to tell Rob that he can do anything he wants in his life, and not let Nina's unfortunate death keep him from living his life. At the end of the night, Rob hugs Nina's mother and tells them hell see them next week. He then texts Holly saying how sorry he is, but he still gets no response.Rob sits at his apartment, staring at his bed. Rob is at work, unable to feel. At his apartment, he looks at a picture of Nina, before turning the frame face down.Sleeping on his couch, he hears noises in his bedroom and goes to investigate. As he looks in his room, he hears a knock on the door. It is Holly. Holly asks if Nina is there. Rob says no. Holly then asks him if he wants Nina to be there. Rob tells her no. Rob thought she wanted nothing to do with him anymore after what happened, but Holly reveals she saw all his texts and decided to see him after he stopped sending them. Rob brings her inside and warms up her freezing body and they begin to make out and get naked. Rob stops, realizing that if they try to have sex again, Nina will show up. We can cope, Holly says understanding. They begin to kiss again, but Rob stops once more. Rob shows her his tattoo of Nina Forever in shame, realizing his inability to let go all this time has perhaps caused this to happen. Holly kisses his back near the tattoo to display her sympathy and understanding.In bed, Rob and Holly proceed to make love again. Blood begins to pool in the bed. Holly sees it but tells Rob to keep going. Nina's hands reach out of the bed and grab on to Holly's breasts, gripping them tightly. To take her mind off what is happening, Holly tells Rob to kiss her. As they break away, they both see Nina once more in the bed, looking at them with disdain. Holly tentatively tilts her head to Nina's and kisses her. "You're so warm", Nina says. Rob kisses Holly who nods, letting him know it is okay. Rob kisses Nina then proceeds to keeping have sex with Holly until he climaxes. Holly turns back to Nina, trying to pleasure her with her hands. However, Nina explains that all she feels is her injuries and that Holly shouldn't bother trying to give her pleasure. Holly says she just wants her to feel good, but Nina curtly tells her to stop.Nina then proceeds to toy with Holly, telling Rob is just using her for sex. Nina will always be in Rob's head first because of the past they shared and the sexual fantasies they experienced together. She equates Holly to an oil painting that is still wet. The very fact that Nina is dead and has no next makes her most appealing to Rob.Rob then defends Holly, saying that SHE is his girlfriend and though they don't know how to fix this situation, they will deal with it. Nina says they cant break up because she died. Rob says he breaks up with her now, only to be told that wont help him either. Rob continues to argue with her, saying she cannot expect him to be alone forever. Nina notes that he isn't. Rob tells her just because he wants to move on, doesn't mean he wont forget her and what she meant to him. What the fuck does that mean? Nina asks. Rob tells her she is impossible and turns away from her on the bed. Holly, who has been on the edge of the bed getting dressed, listens as she is basically ignored by Rob and leaves. Rob says he doesn't know what Nina wants. "I don't want anything", she notes as death has robbed her of human desire despite the ironic fact that she does want something; to have Rob all to herself even if life itself separates them.Holly is seen walking alone on a stretch of road. Apparently the area is where Nina died.Rob wakes up, once again in a blood soaked bed. He walks out into his living room, to find Holly on his couch, holding a cup of coffee, and smiling at him. Despite everything happening, she loves him, and cares enough to handle this strange situation together. They go and throw away the latest round of ruined sheets and buy countless sets to replace them when Nina arrives.Holly talks to Rob saying she feels she should do a memorial of some sort for Nina, to show how much she cares. At a tattoo parlor, while Holly gets a tattoo, Rob explains how he first crashed his bike and how he wanted to get scars. Nina told him that he would probably die first but she would never die. Holly asks if he got the Nina Forever tattoo after her death, but Rob admits they got it the night of his first bike accident. Rob tells Holly about Nina's love of art, and printing presses and how it mattered to her. Rob asks Holly if she is sure she wants to her so much about Nina, but Holly says it is okay.One day, as Holly and Rob have sex again, Nina appears once more. Holly pulls off the bandage of her tattoo, showing she too got Nina Forever on her back. "What the hell Rob, you're branding them now?" Nina asks incredulously. Rob tells her that it was actually Nina's idea, to honor her. Holly tells her that she knows what this is about; Nina is afraid to be forgotten. She tells Nina that she won't be forgotten and she can never take her place, so it is okay to pass on. Nina begins to mock Holly for being a fool. She tells her point blank that she would prefer to be in oblivion then be back like this. Her reappearances have nothing to do with wanting Rob back. She is only back due his deep rooted agony over losing her. She reiterates that she doesn't want anything.As Holly gets dressed, Nina mockingly says the least she could do for her was read a book out loud. Holly gets mad, saying she will continue to fuck Rob as much as she wants and she will read to Nina if she wants but Nina will not drive her off. Holly asks if Rob is going to say anything. Rob tells Holly he loves her, only for Nina to interject that he cannot forget her. Nina tells Holly she still doesn't get it, pointing to their now matching tattoo of Nina Forever; Nina on some level wants to be forgotten. Because she is kept in spirit so much by Rob, her parents and now Holly, it makes even more difficult to get rid of her.Holly stands in the bathroom, apparently waiting for Nina to disappear from the bedroom.Holly asks if Rob wants Nina to come back. Rob says no, as they change their sheets to a red color this time. Rob says though he doesn't want Nina back, he doesn't know how to make her stop. Rob then gets an idea, asking if Holly will meet Nina's parents. Holly looks at him weirdly, but Rob explains that Nina's parents had hoped he would meet someone new. If he can show them that he is moving on with her, perhaps Nina's spirit will accept it too and move on.Holly and Rob meet Nina's mother at the cemetery. Rob talks to her privately first. Nina's mother cries and hugs him, happy he is starting to find peace. They proceed to have an awkward dinner with Nina's parents. Things get off to a bad start when Nina's father has to leave the kitchen when he sees Holly is sitting where his daughter used to sit. Furthermore, Holly becomes enraged to find out that Rob has a Ph.D. but is squandering his potential (plus the fact she knows little about his personal life) and that he has been going to see Nina's parents every week since she died. Rob tells her that they need him lest they dissolve into grief so Holly says he can have them and angrily gets on the bus, refusing to sit with him. Holly says she felt like she didn't matter to him. Rob tells her that isn't true. He is around Nina's mother a lot because in part he is all she has left in the world. He wanted her to meet Holly because he loves her. Holly tells him to prove it.At Nina's grave, Rob and Holly make out. God, you are dark, Rob exclaims. Holly unzips his pants and they sit on the gravestone, with Holly on top and they begin to have sex, literally, on Nina's grave. Nina shows up, and slides over the gravestone, coating it in blood. She tells them that the two of them are quite rude for having sex on her grave. She cradles Rob and once again, tears into Holly as she jerks Rob off, reminding her once more than she is nothing more than a sexual surrogate to assuage his grief over losing Nina. Rob pulls away in disgust and zips up his pants. Rob asks Nina if this how she wants to say goodbye. Nina says no, though crashing through a windshield wasn't how she wanted to go either. Sometimes you don't get a choice and you never really say goodbye.Nina crawls over to Holly close and tells her that she has been coddled her entire life and that she knows nothing and is nothing. She means nothing to Rob and to Nina and that will never change. You cant even put your own trousers on, Nina cackles. "NINA, STOP!" Rob screams.Rob holds Nina and tells her that he is finally letting go of her, that he is saying goodbye. He is going to their apartment and getting rid of every last trace of her. Nina looks and Holly. "I think he's going to ask you to move in with him", Nina says mockingly. "Do you think you can manage that Holly? Living in my house? Do you think you can eradicate every last trace of me?" "Yes", Holly replies. "I love you, Holly", Rob says.Holly moves in with her things. Holly notes that he wont be able to see Nina's parents anymore if they are going to make Nina disappear for good. Rob says he understands, and is willing to pay that cost. They hug. They begin to clean out the apartment, taking out anything directly related to Nina. As they eat dinner, Rob discusses getting her a car. Rob says he will sell his motorcycle, as he doesn't ride it anymore and he only feels up to walking. Holly kisses him in happiness.While Rob sleeps on the couch, Holly looks in a dresser and finds a dress that Nina wore. She takes it out and places it on the bed. Turning on a light, she looks at the printing press kit, Nina had.Later in bed, Rob is asleep but Holly is still awake. She thinks she hears a noise and looks under the bed but nothing is there. She then goes to bed.In the morning, Holly brushes her teeth, only to find a bloody Nina sitting in the tub. They apparently hadn't gotten rid of everything yet. Nina says she is angry they threw out all her stuff and mocks Holly more. Holly turns the mirror away until Nina disappears, leaving behind blood in the tub.Holly looks around the apartment, trying to find other things to destroy of Nina's. Nina shows up on a chair and asks Holly why she thinks she is still hanging around. Holly looks inside a book and finds a picture of Nina and Rob. "Fuck you, Nina", Holly sneers as she tears the photo up and throws it in the trash. She finds more stuff to throw away of Nina's.Nina is still there, watching TV on a laptop one night with Holly as Rob sleeps. As Rob wakes up, Holly notices the blood on the sheets and takes them away. Holly decides to take more drastic measures by painting the apartment white. You missed a bit, Nina mocks. Holly throws away yet more sheets and more potential Nina reminders.Rob comes home and says he sold the motorcycle and they will deliver it. He sees all the new paint and asks why the room is white. Holly puts on Nina's dress and drives off fast, parking near where she died, unable to figure out a next move. Rob comes home and sees her in Nina's dress, asking if that is a new shirt. Holly says yes. Rob then sits in his all white apartment alone.Rob visits Nina's mother, who tells him he deserves his new relationship, while her husband listens to music loudly in another room. She thanks Rob for everything, saying she couldn't go on without his help. She reveals that the love has more or less died in her marriage but she cant find the strength to leave after 30 years. The baggage she has would negate any chance of new happiness. Nina's mother begins to cry and asks if Rob is going to leave them. Rob tells "no, of course not."As Rob packs bags for a trip he is taking with Holly, Holly sits under the bed, looking at something. Rob tells her come along so they can start towards their trip. Holly tells him hes driving.In the backseat, Holly digs into her fingertip with a metal printing press tile. We see the apartment, stripped bare of most things, including Nina's printing press kit. Holly presses the tile in her fingertips. They get to the bed and breakfast they are staying at, and begin to have foreplay, using the tiles to mark each others bodies. They make one spelling out the word Fuck and Rob slowly stamps the word up her legs. Holly pulls her panties down in anticipation and Rob stamps her butt check. She then pushes Rob down on all on the tiles, until a design is printed on his back.Holly tells him to scratch her and make her bleed but Rob refuses. Holly calls him a coward and goes to use the press to make a scratch. However, Nina shows up at that moment and catches her arm in the press, causing her arm to start to break, telling Holly that this is what real darkness is. Rob tells her to stop, but Nina persists. Nina says Holly won; Rob has forgotten about Nina. However, Nina has gotten under Hollys skin, so she will continue to remain. Nina tells Holly she is not ready for a relationship with someone that doesnt need saving. Rob is finally able to pull Holly away from the machine when Nina lets go and tells her he is so sorry.It is at this point that Holly reaches her breaking point, telling Rob that she cannot do this anymore; she cannot be with him if Nina will never leave them alone. Though no one asks her, Nina interjects, saying Holly assessment is accurate, and that it hasn't really worked out.Rob sits on a beach alone, heartbroken.Holly sits in an ambulance, apparently having finished her training. But she too is miserable.Nina is at a crash scene, the same place Nina was killed. She sees a woman, and for a second, she looks like Nina. The woman asks if she is hurt. Holly holds her hand, tells her yes, but they are going to get her out of the car and that everything is going to be okay. Holly is later seen in the locker room, sighing in relief at a job well done. She looks at her arm and notices several bruises. As she undresses, we see her 'Nina Forever' tattoo.Holly sits with a co-worker of hers at a bus stop, who is ecstatic at the work they did. Nina looks at him and realizes that perhaps the only way she can be free, is also to move on, completely from Rob. She takes the mans hand and kisses him.Rob sits at a restaurant and looks at his phone and sees there are no new messages.Holly goes to the guys dorm room and is about to have sex when he notices the Nina tattoo, and inquires that if she was an ex and if Holly is bi. Holly pauses for a moment, and then proceeds to take off her clothes.At the restaurant, a red stain appears on the tablecloth. Rob is met by Nina's parents and tells them he got a new job. They are ecstatic for him and Rob awkwardly thanks them. Rob then finally says that what they are doing isn't healthy, and it isn't helping them heal at all. Nina's father then explodes on Rob thinking it is all about him. He asks Rob what he thinks it was like to see him every week, to help him back on his feet, to get him a job, for him to a constant reminder that his only child is dead and he isn't. He tells Rob he cant help but look at people his age and wonder why they get to live but Nina didn't. He tells Rob he can find someone else; their child is irreplaceable. He tells Rob that he cant stand there and say they didn't help him because they did. Rob tells them he is so sorry and leaves the restaurant.Back at the dorms, Holly takes off her panties, ready to have sex with the other guy. They have sex, and as Holly looks down at the floor, Nina appears. Typical, Nina whispers, thinking Holly's plan to have sex with another person to have no link to her was foolish. Holly then tosses the guy out of her room.The next day, Rob shows up at Holly's dorm. Rob says he had to see her, since she didn't respond to his texts. Rob tells her he's better and he loves her and he wants to be with her. Holly says they can't, and shows him her bed with the bloodstains. Rob recoils in shock, realizing that Holly already had sex with someone else, and yet Nina is still haunting her."I'm sorry", Rob says. Holly tells Rob it was never him that was the problem it was her. Holly had romanticized Rob's tragic link with Nina, and felt that she could fix him. Yet, her whole attraction was apparently around saving a guy with a dead girlfriend, so Nina had been linked to her from the very beginning. While Rob finally found his closure and is no longer haunted, Holly apparently always will since she idealized the tragic end of their romance. "Are you going to be okay?" Rob asks quietly. "Yeah", Holly replies, not believing it herself.We see Holly strip her bed of bloody sheets and change into night clothes.We cut back to a completely heartbroken Rob, who leaves the dorms and Holly though it is clear he does not want to. Holly is now apparently doomed to spend the rest of her life alone as every time she will get intimate with a guy, Nina will appear to taunt and mock her. Since she is no longer with Rob, who could see Nina (because they are linked) Holly must suffer this haunting alone with no hope of it ever ending.

Tags: comedy, adult comedy

Review:
...with a bit of Rom-Com/Horror thrown in for good measure.We all bring baggage into a new relationship - this film makes the invisible visible and takes you on an enjoyable journey through the process of 'letting go': grief, loss, flights of fantasy, darkness, obsession.
And the level of gore is appropriate for the telling of this story: being haunted by an ex- who appears in bed with you and your new partner every time you attempt to have sex.Nina Forever will make you feel, but then it will make you think.
The premise of this movie makes no sense; the ghost of a man's ex-girlfriend shows up, bloody and battered from the accident that caused her death, every time he has sex.
Every time I think that all topics have been covered in film, someone comes along and does something wholly original.
"Nina Forever" starts out a bit chaotic, but it sets a pretty good mood for the movie.However, that mood was quickly gunned down by the utter boredom that trailed along with this movie.
I managed to get to the part where Nina returned from the dead for the second time, then I just couldn't take it anymore.The story is about Nina, who dies in a traffic accident, leaving her boyfriend Rob on the brink of suicide and in a very dark place.
When he does manage to find a shimmer of hope in the form of colleague Holly from the supermarket, Nina returns from the grave to interfere whenever they are being intimate.What killed off my interest in "Nina Forever" was the excessive focus on sex in the about 30 minutes or so that I managed to watch of this ordeal of a movie.
But it was just painfully killed off by the focus on sex and directors Ben Blaine's and Chris Blaine's urge to show nudity on the screen.Sure, I had expected this to be a comedy of sorts, and perhaps one that would bring zombies into the frame.
A British indie written and directed by Ben and Chris Blaine, it's a jet-black sex comedy about a dead young woman who comes back to life whenever her ex-boyfriend has sex.
And he's having a lot of sex with his new girlfriend, Holly (Abigail Hardingham).Avoiding potentially tiresome scenes of endless disbelief, the central couple accept the bizarre situation far more easily than their zombie.
And the Blaine brothers throw into the mix Nina's grieving parents, whose struggles to cope (dad's writing a terrible book; mum's trying to keep her daughter alive through Rob) are funny and moving.The Blaines' control of the material is seriously impressive.
It has always been us Americans that like to remake films, but this is an example of the Brits doing it, and doing it badly.Maybe the filmmakers were just not aware of the excellent Life After Beth from 2014, and maybe it's just one of those occasions when two lots of people have similar ideas, but this film has just recently come out, so I'm not sure.
Having looked forward to watching this film as a possible modern horror classic, I was disappointed - very.The story sounded interesting - one which would open up a multitude of opportunities for exploration and artistry.Unfortunately, it never really developed into anything at all.
THe pace was painfully slow at the start, and continued all the way though the film.Really the only reason for watching this is to see the incredibly beautiful Abigail Hardingham (who plays Holly) naked on many occasions throughout the film.Although I can see what was trying to be produced, it seemed to be more of an extension of some film school project that needed some severe editing to stop the audience nodding off part way through.So, watch this if you want to see Abigail Hardingham - otherwise go and do something more interesting, like watching your laundry go around in the machine..
Great camera direction.The actors give enough to make it work, and that says a lot for them, as this is a very tough film.
I really enjoyed Nina Forever, it's like a really black comedy, that shows how good a film can be made on a tiny budget.The main focus is around a character called Nina who tragically dies, leaving her boyfriend to pick up the pieces of his life, but then she comes back.While being very graphic and very sweary Nina Forever is also very very charming, it's a beautiful story of loves lost, loves found and loves twisted grip.I gather the film was shot on a budget of around $13,000 but took a very long time to make.
Rob, Holly and dead Nina too.
After a period of grief and attempted suicide Robb falls in love with a co-worker Holly - trouble is his dead ex-girlfriend Nina will not leave them alone!
Nina appears, back from the dead, when Rob and Holly engage in sex, and there is a lot of it here.
Nina Forever is the second horror film I have seen this year employing a supernatural context to examine the problems of an excessively possessive ex-girlfriend.
The first one was Burying the Ex, but its general tone had been more humorous and playful, while Nina Forever employs deep metaphors in the shape of a bloody naked ghost which appears while the characters Rob and Holly are having sex.
During their long relationship, Nina was an essential part of Rob's life, and Holly's presence will never be able to erase it, despite how intense and sincere this new love might be.
That's what the characters have to find out while facing the bizarre challenges of their "romantic triangle"; and even though their decisions don't always seem logical or even rational, actors Abigail Hardingham, Cian Barry and Fiona O'Shaughnessy express intense and realistic feelings, making the audience plunge into the confusing (and undoubtedly macabre) situation.
The Blaine brothers employ an unusual narrative style, telling the story with chronological games which sometimes invert the normal order of the scenes (ie, we first see the consequence, and then the cause); that occasionally feels like an affectation, but it generally contributes to highlight the contradictions of the morbid romance, and generate suspense which wouldn't exist otherwise, because the horror is more cerebral than physical.
As I previously said, Burying the Ex took a completely different focus than the one of Nina Forever, but that doesn't mean that both perspectives lack of validity.
This horror-comedy was directed by two brothers and it was theirs first feature film.
I wanted to see it, purely because it had Fiona O'Shaughnessy, a girl who's quickly become one of my favourite actresses, hugely talented, and that voice, she is fantastic, but even she couldn't inject the spark that failed to light this film.
However I have to admit that ultimately by the end I was left with an overall feeling of disappointment and missed opportunity.The overall highlights were the scenes between the main character Rob, Cian Barry, and Nina's parents.
The actress who played Holly, Abigail Hardingham, was a very natural and engaging presence, hanging on in there with the relationship despite all of the bizarre difficulties because she wanted to appear "dark" and not "vanilla" and to be committed to her first real boyfriend (although in reality the actress is too pretty to have been "left on the shelf").
-and this unbalances the whole film.The last half hour was a bit of a drag and the other serious problem, the "twist" ending of switching over the "curse of Nina " to Holly, was silly and felt tagged on.
The Writer/Directors., the Blaine Brothers, should have had the conviction to retain faith in the subtext of people being unable to move on from a relationship.If we had a much sweeter and charming Nina and a more grown up conclusion ( perhaps along the lines of Morettoi/Grimaldi's "Quiet Chaos" ) in which eventually Nina disappeared because the main character was able to finally move on we would have had a poignant conclusion and a more consistent tone to add to the humour and interesting premises.
Nina Forever is the blackly comic debut feature from the writer/director team of Ben & Chris Blaine which begins very promisingly with supermarket drone Holly (Abigail Hardingham) wooing her work colleague Rob, (Cian Barry), into a romantic relationship.
This opening segment is well set up with offbeat humour, convincing performances and a disquieting atmosphere thanks to Oliver Russell's sullen cinematography.Once Rob and Holly hop into the sack however, the brothers Blaine hit premature ejaculation and out pops the bloody apparition that is Nina, spawned from the hereafter for a sabotage mission.
But almost as quickly as Nina's arrival comes the realisation that this is as good as it gets and the story has reached its final destination in stalled county.The scenario is served up again and again and again as, rather than screaming her lungs out and running for her life, Holly perseveres and messes in (pun intended) with replacing the gore stained bed sheets every time naughty Nina appears from the afterlife to spanner the would-be blossoming romance with the supposedly acerbic diatribes spewed forth from the bowels of her gob.Add in Rob's continuing and, it has to be said, occasionally hilarious affiliation with his undead girlfriend's parents, and you've pretty much got everything Nina Forever has to offer.
She looks physically too long in the tooth for young Rob, yet (ironically) lacks the mature thespian chops required to flesh out the complexities this, admittedly difficult role demands, resulting in a double whammy fail.Some compensation arrives late in the shape of Rob's moving confrontation in a restaurant with Nina's Mum and Dad and the torch passing fate afforded Holly in the closing scenes.
If I were to put it in one genre, then it would be "romance", yet somewhere in this dark love triangle we find comedy, horror, drama, gore, eroticism and pure love.
Our emotions are played with in "Nina Forever", and it's exciting to be part of from start to finish.The movie follows Holly and Rob, a young couple who fell in love after meeting each other at work.
Holly finds this out because his girlfriend, Nina, comes back to life while they are having sex.
She continues to torment the couple every time they have sex.The wonderful thing about this kooky concept is that we have no distinct answers as to why Nina returns, but it never makes us question it.
We feel involved but we don't let the mystery of Nina get in the way of what actually matters in the movie - the love story.
Both of those movies follow a recognizable formula, but "Nina Forever" is its own thing entirely.
Nina comes back as something else, more of a ghost, and only comes back during sex to make life harder for the couple.Thanks to the comedy, which is not too crazy or out there, we can relate to this strange story and connect to it as a love drama rather than a horror movie.
There are scenes that could be qualified as necrophilia, several scenes of graphic gore, and a whole lot of nudity and steaming hot sex scenes (always followed by a bloody mess in the bed as Nina makes her entrance).
Luckily the movie remains hard to classify because it doesn't choose to focus on one thing specifically, and this leaving us with the wonderful movie that "Nina Forever" is.Abigail Hardingham, Cian Barry and Fiona O'Shaughnessy make up the lead trio of actors and I am pretty sure that the Blaine guys would have had some problems on their hands if it weren't for these three.
These three lovely actors could not have had an easy time on their hands, trying to balance all of the important ingredients to make "Nina Forever" as lasting and engaging as it is.
It could easily have slipped into the realms of bland or trying too hard, but it never does."Nina Forever" is one of the bloodier romances, but don't confuse that with being a horror movie.
It shows several aspects of a horror movie, obviously, but there is a heavy focus on comedy, drama and romance as much as there is on blood and gore.
Whether "Nina Forever" sounds like it would be up your alley or not, it is a movie that I highly recommend to all of our readers..
I'm not really sure what it is or what it even wants to be, expect to say that it seems to copy the American comedy movie LIFE AFTER BETH in the tale of a guy who keeps being haunted by his dead girlfriend, killed in a car accident.What it boils down to is that NINA FOREVER is a mess of a film.
The only thing it succeeds in being is grotesque, with lots of icky sex scenes in which a bloody corpse comes into play.
I also found the whole film to be oddly depressing because it's so poorly achieved.Unlike other reviewers, I didn't have a problem with Fiona O'Shaughnessy's acting as the oddball Nina.
There's more to life than sex after all.It doesn't help that Cian Barry and Abigail Hardingham aren't very good actors either, although at least the latter has a nice figure, and perhaps the reason for her casting was her willingness to show it off.
In any case, NINA FOREVER is a tough film to watch, purely because it's so dull, vapid, and pointless, and it actually made me feel depressed about human existence.
'Nina Forever' is a film that is tough to describe in a nutshell and say which genre it belongs to.
Yes, it does have a ghostly corpse of a dead ex-girlfriend returning to haunt Rob and Holly whenever they decide to engage in sex.
For me, I think at the heart of it, the film is a hardcore drama about the pain of suffering a loss and the difficulty to move on and also the effects that one partner's baggage and the trauma that he/she brings to a relationship has on the other person.Similar to 'The Babadook', 'Nina Forever' uses some of the elements of the horror genre to explore grief and the struggle to move on after the death of a loved one.
Holly, a shy girl who works at the same supermarket as Rob gets intrigued by him and they end up dating.
The problems arise when the corpse of Nina start appearing whenever Rob and Holly have sex.
Why do we not get too many scenes involving Rob and Holly having tender moments with each other except one or two?
Holly and Rob didn't actually enter this relationship because they admired or liked each other.
From Holly's point of view this is a bit of a disturbing coming of age story.
The film ends with a marvellous shot of Holly on her bed now with black bedsheet.
The performances are straight all across the board.'Nina Forever' is a very heartfelt film about grief, trauma and relationship baggage.
It might throw a pessimistic light on romance and relationships, but the mature way in which the directors treat the story and the characters, ends up distinguishing this film from the Hollywood comedies with similar plots involving dead girlfriends coming back.
I wouldn't exactly put this film into the "HORROR" genre, although it gets bloody at times.
There is a lot of 'maybe this will fix it?' to no avail, this works as a pretty accurate portrayal of real life problems, but it doesn't make for a very entertaining movie.Overall there are enough plus points here to say that it was a story worth telling, it just seems like it might have been better served in book form, especially since the same story has also been told better through film before..
Co-worker Holly (Abigail Hardingham) who didn't like be called "vanilla" by her last boyfriend develops a dark side.
Her and Rob hook up and discover that his dead girlfriend Nina likes to make appearances during their love making.Normally such an absurdity would prevent any more such contacts, but Rob and Holly decide they will work through it as the scene turns bloody and requires frequent cleaning.
Nina's sharp tongue and catty attitude become the highlight of this dark comedy,I liked the film up until the ending when the humor aspect fell short as compared to the rest of the feature.
It is a good film for indie lovers.If you liked "Burying The Ex" and "Life After Beth" give this one a view.Guide: F-bomb, sex, nudity (Fiona O'Shaughnessy, and thank you Abigail Hardingham ).
Interesting, original and depressing horror romance comedy.
So this is a horror comedy that revolves around a lot of sex.
I did like the dark tone in this film and how it goes into a more realistic direction when it comes to relationships and why certain people fall for each other.
It gets pretty depressing watching two character just mope around and having sex while dealing with inner pain.
Surprising small British black comedy of horror, undead, with surreal touches, which highlights the performances of the three young protagonists, specially Fiona O'Shaughnessy, the dead chick.
It reminded me in a way that other British jewel, fantasy genre, called "Cashback", perhaps only because the work environment at the supermarket...A very interesting movie, except at the ending, in the resolving of the love triangle situation, maybe because I expected something more brilliant....
The main issue is that it follows the same scenes over and over again, the couple is making love, the dead ex-girlfriend mysteriously appears from under the sheet and so on.
After one hour I had to stop it and finish the film two days later, it was that boring.Maybe more complex it was better and not so humble with the story, the only good aspect is the acting witch wasn't too bad and Nina's appearances who were creepy, at least for me.
Only to watch by fans of the resurrection, blood, tender and horror all this put together in a film and you get Nina Forever.