Month: April 2019

Dragged Across Concrete (2019)

Written for RAF News April 2019

Brett Ridgeman and Anthony Lurasetti are street cops with a reputation in this pulpy, crime thriller. When a video leaks of them beating a suspect in order to complete a bust, they are duly suspended without pay that they desperately need.

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Brett (Mel Gibson) is out of prospects, almost 60 with his ex-partner of twenty years ago now in a cushy office job above him, he decides to go rogue and do some police work off the books to “acquire proper compensation”. Much younger and mouthier, Anthony (Vince Vaughn) comes along for support with nothing more to lose. That is until a stake out for a drug-dealer turns into something much bigger than they anticipated.

Dragged Across Concrete is split between a few perspectives, from the point of view of these bickering cops, to ex-con turned getaway driver Henry Johns (Tory Kittles) and the ominous black-masked character that hired him. Able to see the criminals’ capacity for extreme violence against any and everyone, with such a calm disposition, it becomes a constant reminder of the threat that faces these disgraced cops, a sword of Damocles dangling above them.

Known for the uncompromising brutality of his previous films Bone Tomahawk and Brawl in Cell Block 99, S Craig Zahler sets expectations with this equally foreboding title and makes good on his promise. It is a much longer film with deliberatley slow pacing, but there is an artful cultivation of tension at play. The unflinching use of sudden horrific violence plays so unpredictably that you can’t trust any scene. No-one is safe.

There is a certain rhythm to jump-scares and moments of shock in which you are made to flinch despite knowing that it was going to happen. This film ignores the rhythm completely so that you can’t predict what’s going to happen.

Dragged Across Concrete is a noir-infected, exploitation-inspired buddy cop movie with its tongue in its cheek. It is extreme in it’s darkness but with a lot of comedy to help it go down.

Styx (2019)

Written for RAF News April 2019

Styx follows German first responder Rike as she embarks on a solo sailing trip from Gibraltar to a remote island in the tropical mid-Atlantic, looking for an escape into a paradise of wild untouched nature. During the voyage however she makes a discovery that plunges her deep into a moral dilemma.

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The first half of the film is masterful, with an almost dialogue-free series of scenes that demonstrate Rike’s proficiency on her small yacht, the Asa Grey. A fleeting prologue already having shown her competence treating someone under pressure, and then faced with navigating through a storm, she is shown to be extraordinarily capable.

Sure to collect comparisons to All is Lost with Robert Redford, but where that was concerned solely about self and survival, Styx is able to tackle questions of morality that have a resonant sting. It is when Rike nears Cape Verde that she spots a large trawler ship that doesn’t appear to be moving or communicating through it’s radio. It becomes clear that there are many people on this boat, refugees, in desperate need of help.

The film is very clever in the way that it aligns you with this one extremely competent and compassionate character, crystallising the heroic human instinct. This is played in contrast to the largely faceless authorities, the coastguard to whom Rike persistently leaves distress calls and demands attention.

Suzanne Wolff plays a pivotal role as Rike and gives her a raw authenticity, from her fighting instinct to her helplessness, evidently she is not superhuman. On screen for the duration of the film, she anchors questions of morality, having to decide whether to follow seemingly immoral instruction or risk her own safety.

Styx is a lean, stripped back thriller that relies on camerawork and performance over special effects, and yet it manages to craft an involving social commentary whilst looking and feeling completely realistic.