The black and white film Dominion made its debut to America Sunday Oct. 23 at the Savannah Film Festival. The term black and white is used loosely as it was predominantly a series of grey tones making the film as muddy as Dylan Thomas’s final hours. Dominion is about the final day of poet Dylan Thomas’s life where he took 18 double shots of whiskey; as each shot is taken, he names them one by one after a significant moment or feeling he has had during his life. Innocence, hope, regret, disappointment and the list goes on.

As the story progresses, we learn more about Dylan as well as how he affects the people around him. People put their faith and futures in the sweaty hands of their poetic hero, only for him to drop them in a drunken stupor. His consistent self-destruction makes one wonder why they would do such a thing; until Tony Hale’s character Brinnan describes the way he can stumble out onto stage and captivate the entire crowd without an ounce of effort. Through his charm, wit and performance, Dylan enchants each and every passerby up until he meets his final companion, the tight-lipped bartender played by Rodrigo Santoro. The cast is star-studded and in the end it’s the secondary characters like Hale and Santoro’s that truly shine.

As previously stated the movie is in black and white, but mainly grey, forcing the audience to focus on things greater than visuals. Pairing with the movie’s main character, its dialogue is something out of poetry. Writer and director Steven Bernstein makes each conversation and description drip with feeling, giving the film an immense sense of depth.

After hearing Bernstein talk about his life’s work and seeing his tears of pure gratitude, Dominion was given an even stronger sense of vulnerability and sacrifice. The movie is still not fully finished due to mishaps with funding and set, but with hope and plenty of support, Dominion will reach the public one-day. If/when it does, I recommend sitting down on a rainy day and revel in the raw emotional turmoil that Dominion encompasses.