![]() Being fairly new to the game, he really outdid himself and created a suspense-ridden film in Coherence, especially considering that the whole film takes place in a living room and has a very low budget. ![]() This movie is a true ode to storytelling and credit has to be given to the director, James Ward Byrkit, whose only other credit for directing is Rango (he’s done some shorts and TV shows but these are his only major film credits). Not what your best self would do, but what your worst self would do. It makes you turn the microscope on yourself and ask yourself what you would do in a similar situation. It’s an interesting examination of what holds people together and what tears them apart, examining how people hold up in incredibly stressful situations. This movie is simultaneously a suspense, a thriller and a sci-fi with a healthy amount of drama mixed in. At one point in the night the power goes off and strange things start to happen, seemingly perpetuated by a meteor that is passing very closely to Earth. What happens next is a whole other story.The story surrounds eight friends who have come together for a dinner party. A committed and expressive ensemble cast keeps the fear real until daylight comes. With no knowledge of where the other actors were going during the scene, the result is a real-time, largely improvised experience. Coherence is experimental in that there was no script, just a notecard given to the actors each morning describing their character’s general motivation, plus the occasional detail to work into the dialogue. The only members of crew permitted on set during the five-night shoot were the cameramen. But Byrkit’s is a pared-down quantum physics lesson, and thanks to some colour-coded glow sticks the proposed theories are easy for the audience to follow.Įver in the background is the question: which version of ourselves would we choose, if we could? Which would we let die? There’s a pertinent discussion about Schrodinger’s Cat Theory and all sorts of alternate-reality weirdness. Meanwhile there are all sorts of handheld-camera scares and things that go bump in the dark. Initially there are all kinds of theories about what is causing all the strange incidents: Beth (Elizabeth Gracen) talks about a freaky feng shui “vortex” in the house one of the guests may be a tiny bit psychic someone else may have put an echinacea-ketamine cocktail in the food. And they return with a box full of unnerving clues. He and Amir (Alex Manugian) have seen a mirror of their dinner party: same house, same people. (Not 1984’s Night of the Comet, Valley-girl crazy, but crazy for real.) After the lights go out, Hugh (Hugo Armstrong) decides to wander over to the only lighted house in the neighbourhood and phone his astrophysicist brother, who instructed him to phone if anything seemed amiss as the comet passed. Could it have anything to do with the comet, scheduled to pass unusually close to Earth that night?Įm indulges in a little comet history and how it can make people loopy. Weird, no one else can get cell service at all. ![]() Em (Emilly Foxler) is a dancer who nearly made it Mike (Nicholas Brendan) is a TV actor no one can remember Em’s beau Kevin (Maury Serling) may still have the hots for Laurie (Lauren Mahir) assorted substance-abuse specters and career disappointments lurk just below the surface.Įm arrives at the house after having had her cellphone crack while she was holding it in her hand. Each guest has some secret regret that they bring to the table, literally. The evening begins with a typical yuppie dinner party: bring your own bottle and bring your own baggage. After a summer of blockbuster excess, it’s time for a little reminder that filmmakers can occasionally make a big splash with a drop-in-the-bucket budget.Įnter Coherence, a film written, produced and directed by James Ward Byrkit.ĭespite tight finances and tighter shooting schedule – just five nights – Byrkit has crafted a thoughtful sci-fi mystery that plays with the concepts of identity, reality and, ultimately, the importance of not getting rid of your landline.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |