neo-noir

THE DOG: obsession and desperation in Mombasa

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Alexander Karim in THE DOG. Courtesy of Cinequest.

The electrifying thriller The Dog follows a classic neo-noir premise. MZ (Alexander Karim), a low level hood, is assigned to drive the call girl, Kadzo (Catherine Muthoni), and he falls for her – against the explicit instructions of their employer and advice from Kadzo herself. To stake a new start for them in a faraway land, he reaches for the big score. Desperation results. What’s unusual about The Dog is that it’s exceptionally exciting and that it’s set in Mombasa, Kenya.

In his quest to make a quick fortune, MZ tries to cash in on a tip about a drug deal. When that goes awry, he finds himself owing a huge debt to Saddam (Caroline Midimo), one of Mombasa’s crime matriarchs. He then tries working with Saddam’s rival Ainea (Veronica Mwaura). MZ takes more and more risks as he get more deeply entangled with the two godmothers. All the way, he’s just one double cross away from disappointing the last people he’ll ever disappoint.

There’s a wonderful low-speed tuk tuk chase (on three-wheel taxis) through Mombasa’s open air markets, street performers and herds of goats. And there’s another unforgettable scene that will be particularly uncomfortable for male audience members.

The Dog matches up well to Howard Hawks’ definition of a great movie – three great scenes and no bad ones“. My FOUR nominations for the three great scenes:

  • a big spender who owes MZ money brings him to his home;
  • Kadzo has MZ film her latest video ad, and he watches her at her sexiest through her cellphone camera.
  • Kadzo explains that she is not asking anyone to save her;
  • MZ faces his reckoning,

The Swedish-born Alexander Karim is superb as MZ. MZ works out to maintain a physicality that intimidates johns and debtors, but he knows his place in the crime hierarchy and grovels before the godmothers; when he screws up, he knows the consequences and moves directly into desperate terror. Alexander Karim has worked in lots of Scandanavian films (so he must be familiar with Nordic Noir) and appeared in Gladiator II.

Catherine Muthoni in THE DOG. Courtesy of Cinequest.

Catherine Muthoni is very good as Kadzo. This may be a neo-noir, but Kadzo isn’t a manipulative femme fatale – it’s only MZ who drives himself to his fate. Midimo and Mwaura are wonderful as the two crime bosses. Watch for how matter-of-factly Midimo dons Saddam’s eyeglasses in the most extreme scene.

The Dog is brilliantly directed, and edited. The director is Alexander’s Ugandan-born brother Baker Karim, who is also based in Sweden. That makes The Dog a Swedish movie, although it has every appearance of a Kenyan film.

Until midnight on March 31, you can stream The Dog from Cinequest’s on-line festival Cinejoy for less than ten bucks: buy ticket to watch The Dog.

SILENT SPARKS: but weren’t they cellmates?

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Photo caption: Guan-Zhi Huang and Ming-Shuai Shih in SILENT SPARKS. Courtesy of Cinequest.

In the Taiwanese neo-noir Silent Sparks, small time hood Pua (Guan-Zhi Huang) is released from prison and checks in with the local crime lord (Chih-Wei Cheng). The boss assigns him to a lieutenant, Mi-Ji (Ming-Shuai Shih), who happens to be Pua’s former cell-mate. But when Pua and Mi-Ji meet again, the encounter is a study in social awkwardness. Pua just wants to start earning money and working his way up in the syndicate, but Mi-Ji is surprisingly unhelpful.

Pua finally gets the chance to do some crime, and we wonder, will Pua get caught, or worse? And what explains Mi-Ji’s behavior toward Pua? As Silent Sparks smolders on, the risks escalate.

The lead actors are very good. Chih-Wei Cheng is very funny as the crusty, vulgar crime boss, who is full of joie de vivre. Jui-Chun Fan is exceptional as Pua’s mom.

Chih-Wei Cheng in SILENT SPARKS. Courtesy of Cinequest.
Jui-Chun Fan and Guan-Zhi Huang in SILENT SPARKS. Courtesy of Cinequest.

Silent Sparks is the first feature for writer-director Ping Chu, and it’s a promising debut. I screened Silent Sparks for its US premiere at Cinequest.

THE DOG: obsession and desperation in Mombasa

by
Alexander Karim in THE DOG. Courtesy of Cinequest.

The electrifying thriller The Dog follows a classic neo-noir premise. MZ (Alexander Karim), a low level hood, is assigned to drive the call girl, Kadzo (Catherine Muthoni), and he falls for her – against the explicit instructions of their employer and advice from Kadzo herself. To stake a new start for them in a faraway land, he reaches for the big score. Desperation results. What’s unusual about The Dog is that it’s exceptionally exciting and that it’s set in Mombasa, Kenya.

In his quest to make a quick fortune, MZ tries to cash in on a tip about a drug deal. When that goes awry, he finds himself owing a huge debt to Saddam (Caroline Midimo), one of Mombasa’s crime matriarchs. He then tries working with Saddam’s rival Ainea (Veronica Mwaura). MZ takes more and more risks as he get more deeply entangled with the two godmothers. All the way, he’s just one double cross away from disappointing the last people he’ll ever disappoint.

There’s a wonderful low-speed tuk tuk chase (on three-wheel taxis) through Mombasa’s open air markets, street performers and herds of goats. And there’s another unforgettable scene that will be particularly uncomfortable for male audience members.

The Dog matches up well to Howard Hawks’ definition of a great movie – three great scenes and no bad ones“. My FOUR nominations for the three great scenes:

  • a big spender who owes MZ money brings him to his home;
  • Kadzo has MZ film her latest video ad, and he watches her at her sexiest through her cellphone camera.
  • Kadzo explains that she is not asking anyone to save her;
  • MZ faces his reckoning,

The Swedish-born Alexander Karim is superb as MZ. MZ works out to maintain a physicality that intimidates johns and debtors, but he knows his place in the crime hierarchy and grovels before the godmothers; when he screws up, he knows the consequences and moves directly into desperate terror. Alexander Karim has worked in lots of Scandanavian films (so he must be familiar with Nordic Noir) and appeared in Gladiator II.

Catherine Muthoni in THE DOG. Courtesy of Cinequest.

Catherine Muthoni is very good as Kadzo. This may be a neo-noir, but Kadzo isn’t a manipulative femme fatale – it’s only MZ who drives himself to his fate. Midimo and Mwaura are wonderful as the two crime bosses. Watch for how matter-of-factly Midimo dons Saddam’s eyeglasses in the most extreme scene.

The Dog is brilliantly directed, and edited. The director is Alexander’s Ugandan-born brother Baker Karim, who is also based in Sweden. That makes The Dog a Swedish movie, although it has every appearance of a Kenyan film.

I screened The Dog for my coverage of Cinequest.

LAKE GEORGE: when you know you’re not going to win

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Photo caption: Carrie Coon and Shea Whigham in LAKE GEORGE. Courtesy of Magnolia Pictures & Magnolia Releasing.

As the comic neo-noir Lake George opens, the hangdog Don (Shea Whigham) has just been released from a ten-year stint in prison. He has no prospects and is coerced by the fearsome crime lord Armen (Glenn Fleshler) into taking a job he doesn’t want. Having done his stretch for a white collar crime, Don is decidedly non-violent (and unlucky). He would be the first to agree that he is the worst possible choice to pull off a murder-for-hire, but Armen and his henchman Hanout (Max Casella) insists, on pain of Don’s own life, that Don whack the boss’ girlfriend and business associate, Phyllis (Carrie Coon).

Don tracks down Phyllis, and, of course, things do not go according to plan. She convinces him to join her in stealing stashes of loot from Armen, and the two are off on an odd couple road trip.

Phyllis is much, much smarter and quicker-thinking than any of the men in this story. And she’s just as ruthless, too. She has an impressive gift of persuasion and can apparently manipulate anyone into anything. Imagine if Brigid O’Shaughnessy were a lot smarter than Sam Spade. Femme fatale, sociopath – that’s Phyllis.

Don, on the other hand, kno ws that he has been a loser and that he ain’t gonna win this time either. Even if he is not quickest, Don is by no means stupid. Don is smart enough to know that doing Phyllis’ bidding is unlikely to work out and that Phyllis is only out for herself and has zero loyalty to Don. That’s the core of Lake George – Don trudging along at Phyllis’ side because he can’t figure out any alternative.

Lake George is a character study, and it’s an acting showcase for Shea Whigham. Ever dazed by the Phyllis’ increasingly outrageous acts, Whigham’s Don seems to be squinting into a bright light as he ponders how he can possibly escape each situation with his life.

Whigham is one of those character actors who works a lot and is always memorable (The Gray Man, A Country Called Home, Boardwalk Empire, True Detective, The Wolf of Wall Street, American Hustle, Take Shelter). It’s great to see him get a lead role.

Coon has fun with Phyllis’ ever-bubbling self-interest and almost manic charm. It’s an interesting take on the femme fatale because she doesn’t sexually seduce Don. Her smarts and gift of gab are so effective that she doesn’t need to use her gams.

There is a massive plot twist near the end. Lake George was written and directed by prolific TV director Jeffrey Reiner, his first theatrical feature in 29 years.

My personal preference would be to make Lake George more noir by cutting the last minute. But it’s a mildly entertaining lark, and the wonderful character study by Whigham is the most compelling reason to watch it.

Lake George is now streaming on Amazon, AppleTV, YouTube and Fandango.

THE LITTLE THINGS: worth it for Denzel

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Photo caption: Denzel Washington in THE LITTLE THINGS. Courtesy of Warner Bro. Pictures.

I finally caught up with caught up with the neo-noir crime procedural The Little Things on Netflix, and it’s much better than I expected. I had skipped it until now because, upon its 2021 release, it disappointed critics who were eagerly awaiting this neo-noir with Oscar-winners Denzel Washington, Rami Malek and Jared Leto. Its Metacritic rating is a middling 54. True, it’s no David Fincher or Martin Scorsese movie (or even a John Dahl movie) but, compared to the other noirish crime procedurals that you could be streaming (and I watch scores of them), it’s pretty good.

Denzel plays Joe Deacon, who is a deputy sheriff in Kern County, not an exalted position in law enforcement. We learn that Deacon used to be a crack detective in Los Angeles County, but something happened that caused him to leave that department. A Kern County departmental errand takes him back to his old stomping grounds in LA, where some old-timers greet him warmly and some warily. There’s a murder that bears resemblance to an unsolved serial killer case that still obsesses Deacon and the young up-and-coming detective Jimmy (Rami Malek) invites him to help.

The two hash through clues, augmented by Deacon’s institutional memory and his hunches. After some wrong turns, the evidence hints at a primary suspect, Albert Sparma (Jared Leto). Yes, it’s a whodunit, but the real story is about how the earlier unsolved case broke Deacon emotionally, and whether this unsolved case will do the same to Jimmy. Late in the film, there is a reveal of the moment that devastated Deacon. I loved the ending, which is about whether Deacon can find a way to save Jimmy.

Denzel Washington elevates any material and that’s the case here. Nobody does a profoundly sad and very masculine man as well as Denzel. There’s a scene where he drops by and greets his ex-wife which is wrenching, all because of the heartbreak in his eyes. Plenty of actors can portray an emotionally tortured character in a showy performance (think Nic Cage), but Denzel, in an utterly contained performance, can make us understand how a man who is doing everything to conceal his pain, is really shattered to the core.

Malek, whom I have never warmed to, is as reptilian as usual, contrasting oddly with his character’s suburban poolside family.

Jared Leto in THE LITTLE THINGS. Courtesy of Warner Bro. Pictures.

Leto does creepy magnificently, and his Albert Sparma has an especially twisted menace about him.

The Little Things was written and directed by John Lee Hancock, who directs better movies that others write (The Rookie, Saving Mr. Banks, The Founder) than the ones he writes (The Alamo, The Blind Side, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil). The Little Things is a bit too long at 2:08.

Still, Denzel’s performance and the ending make The Little Things a worthwhile watch for fans of neo-noir and of crime procedurals. The Little Things is included with Netflix and Max subscriptions and rentable from Amazon, AppleTV, VUDU and YouTube.

coming up on TV – Dennis Hopper and Robby Müller make things weird in THE AMERICAN FRIEND

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Bruno Ganz and Dennis Hopper in THE AMERICAN FRIEND

Dennis Hopper, in his Wild Man phase, brings electricity to the 1977 neo-noir The American Friend,  an adaptation of the Patricia Highsmith novel Ripley’s Game.   Highsmith, of course, wrote the source material for Strangers on a Train along with a series of novels centered on the charming but amoral sociopath Tom Ripley; her gimlet-eyed view of human nature, was perfectly suited for noir. You can catch The American Friend on Turner Classic Movies on July 29.

German director Wim Wenders had yet to direct his art house Wings of Desire his American debut Hammett or his masterpiece Paris, Texas.  He had directed seven European features when he traveled to ask Highsmith in person for the filming rights to a Ripley story.

In The American Friend, Zimmermann (Bruno Ganz) is a craftsman who makes frames for paintings and dabbles in the shady world of art fraud, making antique-appearing frames for art forgeries.   Here, Tom Ripley (Dennis Hopper) entangles him in something far more consequential – a murder-for-hire.

As befits a neo-noir, Zimmermann finds himself amid a pack of underworld figures, all set to double-cross each other with lethal finality.  In very sly casting by Wenders, all the criminals are played by movie directors: Sam Fuller, Nick Ray, Peter Lilienthal, Daniel Schmid, Gérard Blain, Rudolf Schündler, Jean Eustache.  Nick Ray is especially dissolute-looking with his rakish eye-patch. Sam Fuller, in his mid-60s, insisted on performing his own stunt, with a camera attached to his body on a dramatic fall.

Bruno Ganz in THE AMERICAN FRIEND

As the murder scheme unfolds, there is a tense and thrilling set piece on a train, worthy of The Narrow Margin.  Other set pieces include a white-knuckle break-in and the ambush of an ambulance.

Here’s one singular sequence.  After a meeting with Ray, Hopper walks away from the camera along an elevated highway.  Then Hopper is shown, still on the highway, in long shot from what turns out to be Fuller’s apartment, where Fuller interrupts the filming of a skin flick to deny having a guy shot on the Paris Metro.  Then we see Hopper on an airplane, and then Ganz on a train.  Finally, Ganz returns to a seedy neighborhood by the docks.  It’s excellent story-telling –  at once economical and showy and ultra-noirish .

Dennis Hopper and Nick Ray in THE AMERICAN FRIEND

Cinematographer Robby Müller pioneered use of fluorescent lighting in The American Friend. The nighttime interiors have a queasy eeriness that match the story perfectly. Müller, who died in 2018, was endlessly groundbreaking. He made the vast spaces of the Texas Big Bend country iconic in Paris, Texas. He was also responsible for the one-way mirror effect in Paris, Texas’ pivotal peepshow scene. For better or worse, he jerked the handheld camera in Breaking the Waves, spawning a legion of lesser copycats. Müller gave a unique look to indie movies from Repo Man to Ghost Dog; The Way of the Samurai.

Dennis Hopper in THE AMERICAN FRIEND

The American Friend was shot in 1977, in the midst of Dennis Hopper’s tumultuous drug abuse phase. He had just directed his notorious Lost Film The Last Movie and arrived in Europe from the Philippines set of Apocalypse Now!, where he was famously drug-addled and out of control. After getting Hopper’s substance abuse distilled down to only one or two drugs of choice, Wenders gave Hopper carte blanche to take chances in his performance, and The American Friend has the only movie Tom Ridley in a cowboy hat. It paid off in a brilliant scene in which Hopper lies on a pool table, snapping selfies with a Polaroid camera; it’s a brilliant imagining of a sociopath in solitary, with no one to manipulate. John Malkovich, Matt Damon and even Alain Delon have played some version of Tom Ripley. Hopper’s is as menacing as any Ripley, and – by a long shot – the most tormented. Wenders is interviewed on Hopper at the Criterion Collection.

The American Friend is not a great movie. Zimmermann is motivated by a grave health issue, but too much screen time is wasted on that element, causing the movie to drag in spots. Movie auctions come with built-in excitement, but The American Friend’s art auction is pretty ordinary. And, other than Fuller, Ray and Blain, the directors are not that good as actors.

Still, the unpredictability in the high-wire Dennis Hopper performance, the look of the film and the action set pieces warrant a look.

The American Friend will be aired by TCM on July 29th and can be streamed from Criterion, Amazon, AppleTV and Fandango.

Dennis Hopper in THE AMERICAN FRIEND

RUN LOLA RUN: still sprinting after 25 years

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Photo caption: Franka Potente in RUN LOLA RUN. Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.

You’ll never see a more kinetic movie than Run Lola Run, the 1998 German indie thriller which has been remastered in 4G and re-released into theaters. Lola (Franka Potente) has only 20 minutes to raise 100,000 Deutschmarks and save her boyfriend’s life from his gangster boss. In only 81 white knuckle minutes, writer-director Tom Tykwer has Lola desperately sprinting around Berlin in three different scenarios.

Lola’s desperation and the ticking clock make for a pedal-to-the-metal performance by Potente. This also a physically challenging performance. Incidentally, Potente is now a director, and her new film Home with Kathy Bates played at last year’s SFFILM.

Run Lola Run is Tykwer’s masterpiece, and it’s one of the great stories told in real time (which I love).

This is a wonderful movie to see in a theater. Run Lola Run is also available to stream on Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

LOVE LIES BLEEDING: obsessions and impulses collide

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Photo caption: Katy O’Brian and Kristen Stewart in LOVE LIES BLEEDING. Courtesy of A24.

Love Lies Bleeding is a title that legendary film noir director Sam Fuller would have loved, and this highly original neo-noir is a knockout. Kristen Stewart plays Lou, the reluctant manager of a downscale fitness gym in a hardscrabble New Mexico town that is flat, arid and devoid of culture. Love Lies Bleeding may be set in and shot in New Mexico, but this town is not anybody’s Land of Enchantment.

Lou is wallowing through the drudgery of her job, when she eyes Jackie (Katy O’Brian), an aspiring bodybuilder who has just drifted into town. This moment evokes the one in which John Garfield first sees Lana Turner in The Postman Always Rings Twice. The two plunge into a passionate affair, and Jackie, who has snagged a job on her first day in town but is still homeless, moves in with Lou.

But soon, the two find out that Jackie has already become entangled with two folks who are important in Lou’s life – and not in a good way. There’s an impetuous homicide and a “perfect crime” cover-up. Unfortunately, an inconvenient witness, a steroid binge, and more impulsiveness threaten to unravel their lives. Love Lies Bleeding hurtles down an alley filled with robust sex, sudden violence and witty observation.

I will not spoil the ending except to say that, just as I was thinking, “this could go one of three ways”, it went in a totally unexpected direction. And, as I was thinking that writer-director Rose Glass was pivoting completely away from noir conventions, she ends the film with one of the most noirish lightings of a cigarette ever. This is only Glass’s second feature, co-written with Weronika Tofiska. Glass’ 2019 debut feature, St. Maud, earned some buzz.

Like many noirs, this is a tale of obsessions, and it’s a character-driven one, contrasting Lou and Jackie. Lous is measured and intentional, and we learn that her prioritization of loyalty has kept her in this place. Loyalty, and pretty much everything else, is situational for Jackie, whose unfocused wanderlust is another symptom of her captivity to her impulses. Lou is obsessed with Jackie. Jackie is obsessed with reinventing her life, through bodybuilding, through sex, through the next shiny thing.

Kristen Stewart is just so watchable, as she was when I first saw the 17-year-old Stewart in as Tracy in 2007’s Into the Wild. Stewart then bit her lower lip through the Twilight franchise, and, now about to turn 34, is at the top of her game. Stewart is fearless in her choice of scripts and likes to bet on interesting directors. She’s just perfect as Lou in Love Lies Bleeding.

This is the first time I’ve seen Katy O’Brian, and there’s just no getting around that she doesn’t look like most other movie actresses. She’s a martial arts instructor who doesn’t rely on her physicality alone, but uses it to great advantage. O’Brian captures Jackie’s supreme confidence (except when her family rejection bubbles to the surface, and how she is capable of one of the epic steroidal rages. She’s already amassed 27 IMDb credits, including a recurring role on The Mandalorian.

If you’re casting a villain with steely and contained determination, who better than four-time Oscar nominee Ed Harris? Harris comes through as expected, and Glass wittily puts him in a bald-on-top stringy wig that evokes Riff Raff in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. She also gives the character a disgusting interest in bugs.

The rest of the cast is very good, too, including Dave Franco, Jena Malone and Anna Barishnikov, who must be pretty intelligent to play such a profoundly dumb character with such intricacy.

Their obsessions drive Lou and Jackie together in Love Lies Bleeding, and it’s a volatile mix with a wowzer ending.

TO LIVE AND DIE IN L.A.: obsession without an iota of redemption

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Photo caption: William L. Petersen in TO LIVE AND TO DIE IN L.A. Courtesy of Kino Lorber.

It’s William Friedkin Week at The Movie Gourmet, and we’re looking at three of the director’s more overlooked films. First up is his 1985 neo-noir To Live and Die in L.A., now a cult fave of noir fans. It’s a study of amoral obsession without any iota of redemption. Along with directing, Friedkin co-wrote the screenplay.

The secret service agent Chance (William L. Petersen) is consumed with tracking down the counterfeiter Masters (Willem Dafoe). Both are very dangerous men, and it’s pretty clear that no more than one of them is going to survive. Chance’s new partner Vuckovich (John Pankow) has to go along for the ride – and it’s a doozy.

Friedkin begins To Live and Die in L.A. with a thrilling set piece, involving terrorism in a highrise, that introduces Chance as a nervy stud. Then we meet Masters, and learn that he is anything but an ordinary criminal. Just when we have caught our breath, Friedkin toys with us in a scene that establishes that Chance is a reckless adrenaline freak.

The stage is now set for a manhunt, and Chance unleashes all his ruthlessness. Poor Vuckovich stands in for the audience as he and we are repeatedly shocked by Chance’s amorality, even corruption.

The car chase in Friedkin’s The French Connection remains the gold standard, but the one in To Live and Die in L.A. is also extraordinary. This one careens through LA’s freeways (including wrong way on the freeway), industrial areas and the cement channel of the Los Angeles River. The LA River has since been the site of countless movie chases, but it first was prominently featured in Point Blank and To Live and Die in L.A. may have been the river’s first car chase in a mainstream movie. All of the action is photographed by master cinematographer Robby Mueller.

Of course, along with the thrills of the chase and Chance’s astonishing behavior, we also get a counterfeiter procedural as Masters combines art, craft and greed as he prints his own faux money.

Willem Dafoe in TO LIVE AND TO DIE IN L.A. Courtesy of Kino Lorber.

This was Willem Dafoe’s first major film role, just before Platoon and The Last Temptation of Christ. Dafoe, in an understated performance, oozes menace as the smooth, but very lethal, Masters.

William Petersen inhabits Chance with none of the gruff lovability he would show on CSI. It’s a balls-to-the-wall performance. Interestingly, Petersen didn’t get high profile jobs for the next fifteen years until CSI.

Dean Stockwell is perfect as a shady lawyer. Debra Feuer, John Tuturro and the renegade filmmaker Robert Downey, Sr., also appear in supporting roles.

William L. Petersen and John Pankow in TO LIVE AND TO DIE IN L.A. Courtesy of Kino Lorber.

The ending is so dark that the studio insisted that Friedkin shoot an alternative ending, in which a main character improbably survives. Fortunately, that alternative ending was not affixed to the final cut of the film. You can view the alternative ending on YouTube, with the comments of Friedkin, Petersen and Pankow.

To Live and to Die in L.A. is available on Blu-Ray from Shout! Factory and in 4K from Kino Lorber. I’ll let you know when you can stream it or if it shows up again on TV.

FALLEN DRIVE: revenge noir with complications

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Jakki Jandrell and Phillip Andre Botello in FALLEN DRIVE. Courtesy of Cinequest.

The neo-noir thriller Fallen Drive begins with some 20-somethings congregating in a suburban Airbnb ranch house, having returned to their hometown for a high school reunion. It looks like the successful Liam is really more interested in reuniting with his mysteriously estranged younger brother Dustin. Tightly wound Charlie (Jakki Jandrell) and her boyfriend Reese (Phillip Andre Botello) arrive, and it’s apparent that they have an agenda that could be more grim than drinking with high school buddies.

Soon we are enmeshed in revenge noir, in a variation of the perfect crime film. Things get more intense – and more unpredictable – as the story evolves. There are Hitchcockian touches – he suspects us.

Fallen Drive is written and directed by Nick Cassidy (who also plays Liam) and David Rice; it’s the first feature for both. A very strong screenplay elevates Fallen Drive from the paint-by-numbers thriller we see so often. Here Cassidy and Rice have made the characters complicated and added some ambiguity to the back story. There are subtle hints about the relationships of Liam and Dustin and of Reese and Charlie, and the audience is asked to fill in the blanks. You’ll never guess the two characters driving off together at the end.

There’s also a minor character who still parties too much, who could have been written merely for comic relief; but Cassidy and Rice make it clear that his alcoholism has left him immature – that’s why he behaves like a jerk.

The performances are strong. Jandrell is superb as the coiled Charlie. Donald Clark Jr. is also excellent as Dustin, who the others have always found creepy. Cassidy makes for a sufficiently smirky Liam.

An uncommonly textured revenge thriller, Fallen Drive should be a crowd-pleaser. Cinequest is hosting the world premiere of Fallen Drive.