Downrange (2017)

Downrange, directed by Ryuhei Kitamura, is okay, in a sort of super reductive way.  Instead of standard stalk'n'slash fare, which usually being stalked across various locations and slashed one by one, or even trapped in one fairly large location with lots of hidey-holes, this film is limited to one, very small location - the lee side of a car, with a sniper taking potshots at any part of the luckless road trippers huddling on the far side of their crippled vehicle.  It's impressively minimalist, and that bare-basics attitude is applied to the script as well as the narrative.  

We get virtually nil character development beyond some basic young slash fodder stereotypes.    This isn't Wolf Creek, which took its time and developed pleasant, rounded characters before making bad things happen to them in the second half.  

The sniper is never given any motivation or development - though we are allowed to see him - something denied his victims until the end - there is no purpose to this beyond "Oh, there he is."  They might as well have left him completely concealed to us, which might have made him even more terrifying.  

Still, he does set about his work with swift, deadly gusto.  Within minutes of getting our first impressions of the characters we are seeing bloody great chunks blown off and through them.  Impressive enough gore for a microbudget film, but these moments are so showily handled they snap the viewer out of the film - at one point, the camera pulls back through the hole just blasted through someone's head, a trick shot so unnatural it snaps us out of the film.  

Head Like a Hole is a song by Nine Inch Nails

It is a simultaneous "Whoa!" and "Duh!" moment as we are marginally impressed by the technical feat - "You did it!" - but also pause to question the "Why do it?"

It's a demonstration of poor judgement which is repeated at other points.  While the middle section is pretty good, with our characters huddling for dear life while the sniper executing great vengeance upon them with furious rebukes; but the final quarter seems very misjudged.  The tension and trauma is replaced with gory slapstick as some bumbling cops show up.  A luckless family driving along the road are incinerated for no particularly good reason beyond getting to stage a car crash, an explosion and have someone run around on fire.  Fun, but pointless and ultimately diverting our attention from the grim horror of being stuck behind a car with someone shooting at you.  The isolation of the situation is the key to the terror, and flinging cops and passersby about willy-nilly kinda nixes that.

Also, fundamentally, this film can not go anywhere - like the characters, it is stuck.  It is as if the screen writer set out to develp the most reductive scenario possible ... and did so.  There is virtually no meaningful character development - because the heads start exploding less than 14 minutes into the film; the characters can't go anywhere because all they can do is huddle behind the car, devise schemes to try to escape and then abandon them when they realise the sniper can see them whenever they do anything more than huddle.  It is a profoundly terrifying situation to be in ... but not so much to watch.  Even with empathy turned up to the max, it is still pretty dull.  Hence, I suppose, the bumbling cops and flambéed family.

The quintessence of Downrange.  Stare at this picture for ten minutes.  Then stare at it some more.

More depressingly, there's an enthusiasm for killing some characters in unpleasant, protracted ways which seems a bit queasy inducing.  Yeah, we're talking about the black guy here.  Sure, they don't kill him FIRST.  But Hell, do they make him wish they had.  It feels a bit like lib-baiting - though I suppose if we really try hard, we might be able to see something of the shooter's personality in this sadistic targeting.  But it is a reach.

This film has the feel of an assured, gleefully violent debut or sophomore effort by some talented film makers still growing into their ability.  Which is really odd as director Ryuhei Kitamura is a very experienced director.  Hell, he's even older than me.  Looking at his filmography, he seems to do a lot of this sort of thing - gory schlock with shallow characters.  Hell, the main character of one of his films (No One Lives) is simply called Driver.  So I guess this is just his jam.  Nothing wrong with being a low grade horror specialist - but it doesn't always make for interesting films.

Star Rating: *