Friend Request Pending (directed by Chris Foggin)
starring Tom Hiddleston, Philip Jackson and Judi Dench (etc.)
2012
In no more than twelve minutes’ screen time, Judi Dench brilliantly enacts the trivial woes and fever-some turmoils classically evoked by social networking. Through her aged 60-something character, Mary, she illustrates the unyielding ups and downs of mood inflicted by the ways of Facebook, as merciless and tiresome as they can sometimes be. In the hopes of securing a date with a gentleman whom she terms ‘a real fox’, Mary ‘Friend Requests’ him and, within a matter of moments, finds herself attempting to assume a role far unlike her own - that of an online coquette. Almost predictably, an all-too familiar sense of near-sightedness sets in on the scene. Robert, the man in question, seemingly fills the shoes of one who takes a few precious millennia to respond to a message, thus initiating a debilitating frustration in Mary. As the viewers, we witness an almost comical deterioration of her common judgement; she loses her dignified sense of self while pondering aloud illogical worries of what might lay behind Robert’s elusive actions. For a brief pause in time, Mary falls prey to the virtual deceit of the internet, translating the ambiance of the peaceful, light-coloured dining area in which she sits into an extension of endless muddle and mild, un-anchored chaos. The climax of the film’s story nearly pinnacles with the viewers’ collective pity for Mary (what with the consideration of her age and the wisdom expected to accompany it) when it is she, however, who reigns tall in the end. Reason regains prominence in her perspective, enabling her to recall that true communication lies in motive and effort, and not simply on a freely accessible digital platform. Foggin’s film is a work of art in that it encompasses a great lesson in so little a frame and, most importantly, that it serves as its own clever ‘Poke’.
