Director: Rebekah McKendry
Year: 2022
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Supernatural
Plot:
Taking a road trip through the countryside, a desperate man stops at a remote rest stop where he’s confronted by a stranger in the stall next door who begins making requests that border on cosmic assistance, requiring him to put the fate of humanity on his shoulders to complete the duty.
Review:
Overall, this was an incredibly underwhelming if still somewhat enjoyable effort. Part of what makes this one work is the weirdness of the central premise and the relationship that emerges throughout the film. As they spend time together, the random series of games and bizarre tests of his powers that take place provide a grim enough atmosphere alongside the lighter sections where he tries to test the extent of the situation. Realizing that there’s a cosmic bent to him being there and the fate of the universe is at stake, including the attack on the guest that arrives which provides the only gore spot and a frantic final half including the reveal of the creatures’ true form, is a fine way to go about this and provide some likable factors.
There are some big issues that leave this one somewhat troubling. The biggest drawback to the film is a storyline that grows increasingly more tiresome the longer it goes on due to the one-note nature of its premise of a man meeting a celestial being in a rest stop bathroom, the film basically devolves into a never-ending cycle of conversations between them which grows tiresome the more it happens. Since nothing comes up in the conversations beyond clichéd metaphysical nonsense about celestial beings creating the universe and his intertwined destiny in the whole matter, it feels repetitive enough to give off the feeling of an anthology segment that’s been stretched out for a feature-length production.
This also highlights the other factor here involving the lack of urgency or tension present throughout this one. This takes an incredibly long time to get to the point of the whole ordeal, working through a series of conversations about what he’s doing there and that there’s a purpose to the entire meeting but the exact nature of it goes unknown until nearly the hour mark. That leaves the film going back and forth on empty threats without any meaning so it rarely feels tense or threatening which is not helped at all by the comical disassociation that goes along with so many of the segments as if he doesn’t respect their threat so why should we. these factors all manage to lower this one quite a bit from what it could’ve been.
Overview: **.5/5
A generally disappointing if still watchable genre effort, this one does come up a bit short of what it could’ve been so it's a wholly mixed bag of affairs. Those who appreciate the subject matter, the style taken here, or the creative crew will likely appreciate this the most while those who are taken aback by the issues featured here might want to heed caution on this one.
This review ran as part of our 2023 Women in Horror Month celebrations. Click the banner below to check out the rest of our month-long celebrations including various reviews and interviews:
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