Rating: B-
Dir: Joshua Sowden
Star: Guy Birtwhistle, Brant Rotnem, Abigail Kate Thomas, Amy Motta
I think I begin to grasp what Sowden said about “focusing the narrative”. Because this is a film with, really, only one actor physically present on screen. When you hear that, it’s difficult to see how this could work – especially in a movie which combines the notably expansive science-fiction and thriller genres. Yet, in the main, it succeeds, using phone calls, virtual reality and other approaches, to work around the self-imposed limitation and keep things interesting. Birtwhistle plays artifact broker Percival Whitby, who retrieves objects, apparently of extraterrestrial origin, from the ocean floor with the help of a sea-faring partner, and sells them to select clients, who can use the items to reverse engineer advanced compounds and tech.
For obvious reasons, this is a fairly shady line of work, and Percival gets burned after trying to broker a deal with a new customer, Dr. Christopher Mercy (Rotnem), and getting paid in counterfeit money. The buyer works for the Hollow Corporation, an arms outfit, and Percival decides he’s going to retrieve his property. However, arms companies do not take kindly to that kind of thing, as our hero quickly discovers, since his estranged wife (Motta), along with his disabled daughter (Thomas), are put in peril, in addition to his partner. For Dr. Mercy wants Percival to divulge the location from which the artifact was pulled, so he can retrieve the whole alien enchilada for… oh, the usual Evil Arms Company purposes, I would imagine.
It’s probably wise that this runs a crisp 72 minutes, and even at that length, the cracks occasionally show. Most obviously, Hollow Corporation really need to review their security precautions, because the ease with which Whitby sashays in to their facilities will not be winning them many defense contracts. I mean, advanced alien technology, folks. You don’t just hand that over to the first guy who shows up with a clipboard and a truck. It might have benefited from making Hollow into a more ominous threat, since it’s all a bit vague: one guy on the phone can only be so menacing. However, if you can squint past elements like these, I’d suggest this plays at a higher level than you might expect.
That said, I went in more or less blind, so had no real preconceptions. It could be considered as a “gimmick” film, like those filmed in a single shot. Although I feel this would be doing it a disservice. Because once I got past my surprise at the notion, I found it unexpectedly easy to forget, providing a fresh approach to the topic. Birtwhistle comes over a bit like Jason Statham’s smarter older brother, who went to college rather than majoring in banging heads together. For obvious reasons, he has to do a lot of heavy lifting, frequently acting against nobody, and does a good job. I certainly found myself rooting for Percival as he tries to protect both his turf and his family.