Idiosyncratic American filmmaker Alan Rudolph (Trouble In Mind, Choose Me, Mortal Thoughts) has concocted his darkest fairy tale yet in Equinox. He has always been a director of subtle pleasures. His dreamlike, elliptical narratives deal with people who seem to drift in and out of each other's lives, connecting momentarily before moving on. This new, sparkling invention is no different.

The story of twins — one 'dark', one 'light' — each unaware of the other's existence but inexorably drawn to his opposite's web, has a complex and mystifying, cat's-cradle-like plot.

Mathew Modine, in a bravura performance, plays both the gangly shy Henry as well as his other half, the ambitious and vicious thug, Freddie.

Worlds collide as these polar opposites are gradually confronted with the consequences of each other's actions, in this Kafkaesque tale, enhanced by Elliot Davis's often mysterious and slightly unsettling camerawork.

Haunting, jazzy, and saturated with both colour and mood, Rudolph's films are in a class apart and Equinox is a wonderful example of his unique directorial gifts.