| Product: |
Right At Your Door (DVD) |
| Date: |
28/12/06 (219 review reads) |
| Rating: |
 |
Advantages: An interesting story and twist
Disadvantages: Everything else in the film
Right At Your Door is the first big fictional terrorist attack film made in America since 9/11, yes others (Sum of All Fears) may have appeared after the attacks but they were already made, or nearly made, at that time.
RAYD expands on the idea propagated at the beginning of the second series of 24, that of a biological attack on America. In 24 it started in the enclosed space of a hotel and the early episodes covered the ramifications of this, and about how far the American law agencies would go to stop the threat spreading further. RAYD envisions this on a larger scale, an attack on the centre of Los Angeles. Three bombs explode spreading a deadly gas across the city, right at morning rush hour time, leading to the city being cordoned off and the people caught in it quarantined, unable to leave, knowing they are likely to die very soon as they wait to see if they have contracted the virus or not.
Sounds like an interesting premise doesn’t it? It is and a film that looks at how the law agencies deal with the dilemma associated with looking after the public but also controlling them and stopping the virus/gas from being spread to others. It could easily lead to a conflict of morals versus doing what is right, if they had focused on the law professionals and how they feel. What RAYD does instead is go for the human angle, to try and tug at your heart and emotions rather than your morals.
We start off with Lexi (Mary McCormack, High Heels and Low Lifes, E.R.) and Brad (Rory Cochrane, A Scanner Darkly, Dazed and Confused), a working wife and a musician, stay at home husband. When the bombs go off she is in the city on her way to work and he is at home. Brad rushes off to the city from their home in the suburbs but finding everywhere cordoned off reluctantly returns home.
With only the radio for information the official advice for all within a small distance of the bombs is to seal the whole of their house off to stop the toxic gases from getting in. Brad does this with the help of the handyman from next door who sought out refuge in Brad’s house. They tape up every single entry into the house, sealing it with sellotape, heavy tape and using everything including the shower curtain.
Stuck inside, listening to the radio for updates, Brad is surprised when his wife turns up right at his door, wanting to come in for safety.
Will Brad stick to what he has been told, probably condemning his wife to death, or will he break the quarantine and let Lexi in, which could lead to the deaths of both of them?
Right At Your Door has some of the coolest opening credits I have seen for ages, it is the shame that the rest of the film doesn’t live up to them.
By fully concentrating on Brad and his confinement inside the house you feel as if you are missing something all the way through. You want more than the view inside the house, you want to know exactly what is going on outside as well, or I did anyway. The claustrophobic confinement experienced by Brad is echoed in the way we see the film as well, confined in one house while momentous things are occurring outside.
The acting by the two leads is adequate enough and the direction is good enough to not be noticeably bad, but neither are good enough to stand out. I like Mary McCormack, she is a good actress, but here is left with very little to do. She doesn’t really get the chance to do anything except act as a moral dilemma for her husband. I’ve only Ever seen Cochrane as a guy high on drugs in Richard Linklaters two films, in fact he hasn’t done much apart from them and CSI: Miami. He does ok in this but I don’t think he is good enough to be the complete focus of a film, like he pretty much is here.
When I first saw the trailer for RAYD I was mightily peeved because one of the main points they make, by taking a quote from a newspaper review, is that ‘You’ll never expect the twist’. I really don’t understand why you would advertise your film by telling your potential viewers that there is a big twist in it. The viewer is then expecting a twist, is looking out for it (a failing all M. Night Shyamalan’s films have now) and trying to work out what it is going to be, rather than being caught out by it. Imagine Sixth Sense or Usual Suspects if they had told you there was going to be a twist at the end of them. The shock is gone when it happens even if it is a really good twist, or even worse you can actually spot what it is because you are looking for it.
Having seen RAYD I now know why they advertise that it has a twist, why they decided to go against what would seem to be common sense. They tell you there is a twist because looking for it, trying to work it out or just waiting to see what it is is the only thing that keeps you going through the protracted build up to the twist. If it wasn’t for the fact you know it is coming you would give up on this film well before the end. It is bad enough that I literally nearly fell asleep while watching it, though I will say that the twist, when it arrives is a very good one!
RAYD is a great idea but the film is a failure, it just doesn’t excite or get your emotions going, you don’t really get to know enough about the two main characters to really care whether they live or die.
RAYD is most certainly not recommended, unless you want to see if you can work out the twist in its tail!
Summary: A terrorist attack brings fear
|
|
