TimWyatt1 I saw this film at the 5th Annual Native American Film Festival in Keene, NH. Before seeing this extraordinarily well written, directed and produced feature, I saw two shorts that really opened my eyes to the difficult circumstances for many of our Native American citizens today.Prior to the film presentations, I had an opportunity to visit with some local craftsmen at the festival who demonstrated how to pound ash wood to make strips for baskets. There was also a handmade canoe on display that was truly a work of art. I try to make it to at least one pow-wow a year. As always, everyone at the festival was extremely gracious and their humor should be considered a national asset.I've read some of the other comments here and find it difficult to accept that anyone didn't absolutely love this movie. The story within a story concept was done to perfection. If you've never been to the Northwest US, you'll want to go after seeing this film. Every character is so valuably portrayed that I could completely step out of my life and join the story in my mind.I went to the film festival alone because I didn't have anyone to go with me. By the time I left, I didn't feel alone any more. Please let me know how I can get copies of the DVD for myself and to give as gifts. I've recommended this movie to my family, friends and everybody who serves me a cappuccino!

filmvidprod OK, it's very rare that I complain something I got for FREE. So I guess this movie pushed me over that limit. I saw it at the Hollywood Cemetery for FREE and walked away very very disappointed. One audience member's question to the director about using the Native American references just as "bookends" instead of being weaved into the movie better, basically says everything that this movie FAILED on. NATIVE American REFERENCES--- The Native American references felt really out of place and contrived. It's obvious that this director and writer tried tackling an arena they never played in before. They should have stuck to the old adage of "write about something you know". IF they are in fact versed in this it certainly did not show on the movie or the beauty of this unique culture was not given proper justice. Clichés and ON THE NOSE--- I agreed to see this film on the basis that it was an indie. So I held it to higher expectations. "Little Miss Sunshine" was an indie and saw it before it became so popular. Before it even came out to wide release I was already raving how it's going to be a hit. UNFORTUNATELY I could not say the same about "Expiration Date". "Sunshine" took us to cliché incidents but the filmmakers were so clever at their approach that the outcome would take us to a different direction avoiding the trap of being a "cliche". This movie on the other hand had no way of not falling in the trap because it was already TRAPPED from the start. The psycho mom's antics, the Hendrix couple, etc. I hate to say it, but the best and WORST movie I've seen this year were both indies. "Little Miss Sunshine" being the best and this movie being the worst. I wish I could say otherwise. But I do congratulate the filmmakers for having such a good turn out from their family members at the cemetery.

Randolph James (Solipsisticblog) This quirky romantic comedy is the story of Seattle resident Charlie Silvercloud (Robert A. Guthrie), a man destined to die on his twenty-fifth birthday like his father and his father's father. Both were killed by milk trucks. We meet Charlie eight days before his demise as he is trying to get his affairs in order. He breaks up with his girlfriend, purchases a funeral plot, cancels his cable, and tries to spend some quality time with his quirky mother (Dee Wallace Stone).While prepping for death he meets Bessie (Sascha Knopf), a quirky, carefree spirit with a dark secret. Though he wants to enter the afterlife with no attachments, he finds himself falling for Bessie. We also get to spend time at Charlie's job--a coffee shop--where he is hounded by his quirky boss and quirky ex-girlfriend. In this film there are no quirks left unturned including Charlie's portly boss who will only marry a woman who knows the lyrics to every Jimi Hendrix song, including the bootlegs. (Are the lyrics that much different on the bootlegged tapes?) The movie is obviously a labor of love, but it is too quirky by half. Robert A. Guthrie is not charismatic enough to carry the film and Sascha Knopf as the quirky love interest is trying too hard. Unfortunately, the movie is also filmed in DV which is the wrong choice for many films. For claustrophobic tales, horror movies, and documentaries, DV can be a great choice. But this comedy needs air--room to breath. As quirky as this movie is, it needs sharp edges and a hyper-real presentation. DV, though, stifles the comedy and places the film firmly in our mundane universe. DV uglifies and adds authenticity to a film, which is the just the opposite of what this comedy needs.The comedy also carries a message about not forgetting your ancestry. Charlie's father and grandfather ran away from their roots and--given the movie's conclusion--we know this is what led to their deaths. Will Charlie embrace his heritage and be saved from the sins of his fathers? The message feels shoehorned into the movie which is unfortunate because it seems to be the major point of the film.Dee Wallace Stone gives an exuberant performance and it's always fun to see David Keith--as a quirky café customer--on the big screen, but the movie never gels. A misfire.Read more at http://solipsisticblog.blogspot.com/.

TensersFloatingDisk So there's this young man, see, and he knows when he's going to die due to an old family curse, and he spends the last two weeks of his life preparing for his grisly demise.Sounds gloomy, doesn't it? And a bit corny.Happily, Expiration Date avoids both of these two pitfalls adroitly, and what could have been an 'artsy' bit of gallows humor is instead a very surprisingly warm romantic bildungsroman. It is often cheeky, sometimes hilarious, and never self-indulgent.After a brief framing narrative (think of the boy-and-grandpa bits in The Princess Bride) we are introduced to our hero, who believes that, like his father and grandfather before him, he is doomed to be crushed by a milk truck on his next birthday, just a few days hence. The preparations he makes for his imminent demise certainly occasion a few obvious bits of black humor (measuring the view from his burial plot by stretching himself out on the grass) but that takes up a lot less of our character's attention than the young woman who has entered his life and who keeps encouraging him, despite himself, to get involved with living instead of with dying. Her performance, sometimes a bit shrill, is the only sour note I felt in this movie, but I was able to overlook it because the lead character is so charming and she is clearly trying to serve as a foil for that.The plotting is neatly reflexive, with lots of little detailed sub-plots which are brought around later in the movie and wrap the whole bundle up so that it's more allegory than realism. But that turns out to be okay (minus, again like the Princess Bride, the unnecessary framing story), and the leads generally keep things light enough that we excuse the poetic bits. I certainly hope this one finds a distributor. It deserves it.