A Netflix viewing on September 10th. This film was made in 2015 but wasn't released until March 2017. Usually there's a reason for such a lengthy delay, the film stinks. However this is not the case for this picture written and directed by Sean Byrne. This is only the 2nd film that Byrne has helmed and it's pretty darn good.
The film opens with Ray (Pruitt Taylor Vince) having an argument with his mother about his guitar playing being too loud. When Ray's mom threatens to send him back to the hospital, some rather severe misfortune befalls her. The house ends up being sold to the Hellman family, they can't afford it but it just so happens to be priced in their range but they never bother to ask why. Jesse, Ethan Embry as a discount Viggo Mortensen, is a struggling painter who is the quintessential cool heavy metal dad to his Motorhead loving daughter Zooey (Kiara Glasco) and Astrid (Shiri Appleby), the bread winner.
The Hellmans are getting acclimated when Jesse starts getting weird visions. Meanwhile Ray is in a motel playing his guitar and is told by the cops to keep it down. Ray ends up going back home and has a brief conversation with Zooey who takes a liking to Ray's Flying V guitar. Before Ray can enter, Jesse finally shows up and turns him away. Ray leaves the guitar as a gift for Zooey but Jesse insists that she can't keep it.
Jesse's visions start getting worse, he starts to black out and it causes him to be late picking up Zooey after school and to even take his commissioned painting and change it to reflect his visions, suffice to say the bank that commissioned the work will not like the new version.
It doesn't exactly say "we appreciate your business."
While this is going on, Ray kidnaps a young boy, chops him up, places the body in a suitcase and buries it on the property of his old home. There we see that there are several suitcases in the hole. Ray sneaks into Zooey's room and attempts to kidnap her but she screams and Ray flees. The next day, Jesse has a meeting with an art dealer who had previously told him to get lost but likes the darkness of the new work. Of course this makes Jesse lat to pick up Zooey at school. Again. By the time Jesse gets to the school, Zooey is nowhere to be found. In fact Zooey is in Ray's clutches about to be chopped. As Ray prepares to kill her by going through his ritual, all psychos have rituals, Zooey manages to free herself and escape.
The Hellmans are back at the house with the police about to be taking into protective custody when Ray shows up. Ray kills the two cops, shoots Ray and Astrid, takes Zooey upstairs and sets a fire. Jesse, with a bullet wound in the torso, manages pull himself and Astrid to safety, get a ladder from the barn, climb into Zooey's room, bludgeon Ray with his guitar and climb back out the window and down the ladder with Zooey in tow. Jesse manages to not only get the title of "cool dad" back but he even finds the spot where the suitcases were buried.
This is a good film but a 92% Rotten Tomatoes rating is a bit high. The story is very good and there are some solid performances. Byrne builds up the tension nicely throughout the film. Now since this was low budget film the visual affects were not good but I won't harp too much on that. I found it a little hard to believe that Ray could just snatch Zooey from school so easily, especially after an attempted kidnapping the night before. Hell! Why was she even in school? The film takes place in Texas so I am sure there was someone at the school with a gun who would have been more than happy to keep an eye on Zooey until Jesse showed up (to be fair, Jesse got a flat tire en route to the school and he had no cell coverage, given). Then there's the feats Jesse is able to accomplish with loss of blood and a bullet lodged in his torso.
Overall this is a good film that's worth watching if you like horror.
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