I tried posting these comments yesterday but they didn't take for some reason. Here they are again, for that small number of board members who actually watch small-budget indie genre films on a regular basis. This film probably won't appeal to alla youse, but it hit me square in the entertainment zone. Filmed on a shoestring, with virtually no special effects, no overt gore or violence portrayed on-screen, no sex or nudity, Absentia might just qualify for that rarest of beasts -- the PG-13 horror film. The script does contain 3 or 4 effbombs. Gadzooks!!!
I'm not going to give away much of the storyline, and I recommend that any interested parties avoid reviews of any kind in order to experience the Big Reveal without bias. What drove me to see this via a Netflix disk is the overall high ratings given on both amazon and Netflix. I figured there must be something to the film, and I was right.
The story takes place in a run-down, crime-ridden area of Los Angeles (filmed in Glendale, CA). Viewers are introduced to Tricia Riley, a pregnant 30-ish woman who is struggling with the necessity of declaring her husband dead in absentia after his abrupt disappearance seven years earlier. The stress and guilt she suffers is manifested in a few different ways, some of which suggest a couple of familiar genre tropes in the works. Then her wayward younger sister, Callie, shows up to help with packing personal belongings and moving Tricia to a better neighborhood. Callie has had numerous struggles with her family, has been in and out of drug rehab, not quite successfully. Almost two-thirds of this 89-minute film is devoted to set-up through dialog and character development. There are a couple of weird occurrences in that timeframe, but not much that gives away what jaded genre audiences might expect. When the Big Reveal occurs at about the 50-minute mark, the film picks up speed and travels into territory that I didn't quite expect. About the only possible connection I can make and not give away much of the film is that I mentally flashed on an old and beloved Weird Tales story by Allison V. Harding entitled "The Underbody," which has never been reprinted as far as I know.
Writer/director/editor Mike Flanagan shows considerable skill in every department he takes credit for. He uses blurred background to suggest menace and gore without actually showing it. Almost all of the action and subsequent resolution is left for the viewer to provide. Flanagan uses multiple, short flashbacks to show what could have happened to cause all the problems, and these flashbacks are based on suggestions and conclusions by several people who have different interpretations of reality.
The four major actors -- Katie Parker as Callie; Courtney Bell as Tricia; Dave Levine as Detective Ryan Mallory; and Justin Gordon as Detective Lonergan -- have very small filmographies but exceptional talent. All are realistic individuals, not the usual "pretty people" found in a lot of genre films, and their characters thus become real people rather than cannon fodder.
The leisurely pace of the film might turn some folks off. It threatened to do so with my wife, but the tiny hooks kept coming. Genre viewers like myself picked up on several clues to the outcome of the film, but to the writer/director's credit, the clues went in different directions. I was very impressed with the intelligence of the screenplay and the professionalism of the entire crew, and certainly the satisfying result that can be obtained with very little budget.
Highly recommended. One of these days I'm going to find a film that Colossus Rex likes. This might be it.
... Reed
I'm not going to give away much of the storyline, and I recommend that any interested parties avoid reviews of any kind in order to experience the Big Reveal without bias. What drove me to see this via a Netflix disk is the overall high ratings given on both amazon and Netflix. I figured there must be something to the film, and I was right.
The story takes place in a run-down, crime-ridden area of Los Angeles (filmed in Glendale, CA). Viewers are introduced to Tricia Riley, a pregnant 30-ish woman who is struggling with the necessity of declaring her husband dead in absentia after his abrupt disappearance seven years earlier. The stress and guilt she suffers is manifested in a few different ways, some of which suggest a couple of familiar genre tropes in the works. Then her wayward younger sister, Callie, shows up to help with packing personal belongings and moving Tricia to a better neighborhood. Callie has had numerous struggles with her family, has been in and out of drug rehab, not quite successfully. Almost two-thirds of this 89-minute film is devoted to set-up through dialog and character development. There are a couple of weird occurrences in that timeframe, but not much that gives away what jaded genre audiences might expect. When the Big Reveal occurs at about the 50-minute mark, the film picks up speed and travels into territory that I didn't quite expect. About the only possible connection I can make and not give away much of the film is that I mentally flashed on an old and beloved Weird Tales story by Allison V. Harding entitled "The Underbody," which has never been reprinted as far as I know.
Writer/director/editor Mike Flanagan shows considerable skill in every department he takes credit for. He uses blurred background to suggest menace and gore without actually showing it. Almost all of the action and subsequent resolution is left for the viewer to provide. Flanagan uses multiple, short flashbacks to show what could have happened to cause all the problems, and these flashbacks are based on suggestions and conclusions by several people who have different interpretations of reality.
The four major actors -- Katie Parker as Callie; Courtney Bell as Tricia; Dave Levine as Detective Ryan Mallory; and Justin Gordon as Detective Lonergan -- have very small filmographies but exceptional talent. All are realistic individuals, not the usual "pretty people" found in a lot of genre films, and their characters thus become real people rather than cannon fodder.
The leisurely pace of the film might turn some folks off. It threatened to do so with my wife, but the tiny hooks kept coming. Genre viewers like myself picked up on several clues to the outcome of the film, but to the writer/director's credit, the clues went in different directions. I was very impressed with the intelligence of the screenplay and the professionalism of the entire crew, and certainly the satisfying result that can be obtained with very little budget.
Highly recommended. One of these days I'm going to find a film that Colossus Rex likes. This might be it.
... Reed
