Relay a throwback to smart thrillers
Smart, well-acted and containing a narrative switchback I
didn’t see coming, Relay from director David Mackenzie (Hell or High
Water) is a pleasant surprise. This
slow-burn thriller revolves around an intriguing premise that would have been
right at home during the era of paranoid thrillers from the mid-1970s.
Hitchcockian in tone, the film is perfectly in tune with the social media moment
we find ourselves in, the script by Justin Piasecki inverting our society’s
reliance on all things electronic, his story featuring a protagonist that
employs analog methods to subvert modern technology.
Ash (Riz Ahmed) is an intermediary who brokers deals with
major corporations and those that would expose their nefarious practices. He
serves as a middleman, contacting crooked CEOs to let them know he represents
former employees who are in possession of sensitive material they are on the
verge of sending to media outlets. For a
large settlement, Ash will return the documents in question, take a small fee
and pass the rest of the money on to the would-be whistleblower.
His latest client is Sarah (Lily James), a former employee
for Cybo Sementis, a bio-tech firm on the verge of a multi-billion-dollar
merger. The material in her possession, evidence of a cover-up involving one of
their products that would cause great harm to consumers, would scuttle that
deal in a heartbeat. Harassed and threatened, she turns to Ash to broker a
deal. Of immediate concern is Dawson (Sam Worthington), whose team has been
hounding Sarah, setting her car on fire and making it evident they are willing
to do much more to keep her silent.
Seeing how Ash operates is fascinating. He employs a relay service to communicate with
his clients. Used by those who are hard
of hearing, it allows those who call to type out their conversations which the
person at the call center then reads to who is being communicated with. These calls
cannot be traced and no records are kept.
This allows Ash to cover his tracks, as does manipulation of post office
delivery patterns, which allow him to get hard copies of the sensitive documents
and payments without being found out. Never quite sure what Ash is up to next,
seeing each next step of these processes on others play out is intriguing
throughout.
As to what makes our hero tick, Piasecki reveals Ash’s
motivations through the Alcoholic Anonymous meetings he attends. Closed off and hesitant to share, what he
reveals about his past provides logic for his actions. That he grows close to
Sarah and tells her even more about his past allows us to relate to him even
further, Ahmed bringing a quiet sense of pain and longing to the character
that’s all the more affective thanks to his subtle approach.
James is very good as the damsel in distress, though she’s
far from a victim. The actress subtly let’s us know there’s much more at play
where she’s concerned, her scenes with Ahmed revolving around more about what’s
not said than what is. As for Worthington, he isn’t required to do much but
still manages to provide a worthy antagonist. To his credit, he doesn’t phone
it in as he could have.
What’s most refreshing is that Mackenzie has confidence in
the audience. He and Piasecki take their time revealing just what’s at play and
resist the urge to show their cards too soon. They trust the viewer doesn’t need intricacies
of the plot spelled out for them, which makes for a more engaging
experience. This, along with its third-act
plot twist that pulls the rug out from under you, makes Relay a fun
throwback to the era when filmmakers resisted the urge to spoon-feed the
audience and we were all the better for it. In theaters.
Map leads nowhere
They don’t give theatrical releases anymore to the sort of films
Lasse Hallstrom makes. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, he was the
go-to filmmaker for quirky dramas like What’s Eating Gilbert Grape? (1993), The Cider House Rules (1999), Chocolat, (2000) The
Shipping News, (2001) and the underrated An Unfinished Life (2005).
All critical and commercial hits that catered to mature audiences, this kind of
fare was collateral damage once the studios adopted the blockbuster mentality,
giving massive budgets to films they expected to make $1 billion. With this
all-or-nothing approach, Warner Brothers, Universal Pictures and their ilk
couldn’t be bothered with making five films at the same price that would
perhaps accumulate the grosses they were after.
The limited release studios have adapted since COVID-19 certainly hasn’t helped, though the streaming services have provided a soft
place to land for romantic dramas. Unfortunately, more times than not,
the quality of the scripts for movies such as these are lacking. Such is the
case with Hallstrom’s latest, The Map That Leads to You, an adaptation
of the novel by J.P. Monninger who, needless to say, is no John Irving or Annie
Proulx. Insincere though not overwrought, this bland romance is brought low by
its two leads who bring an earnestness to their roles but little passion.
Simplistic and half-baked, this is a film that will play well with the cellphone generation of viewers it’s aimed at. Predictable and told with broad
strokes, you don’t have to really pay attention to it to know what’s going on.
Before starting her banking job in New York City, Heather
(Madelyn Cline) embarks on a tour of Europe with her friends Connie (Sofia
Wylie) and Amy (Madison Thompson). Taking in the sights during the day and
partying at night, the attractive trio are bound to get romantic
overtures. And while Connie finds the
love of her life and Amy winds up being scammed, Heather meets someone who, at
first blush, is a bit of a mystery. Jack (KJ Apa) is a free spirit, the sort
that if you were to meet him in real life, you’d likely want to punch him in
the nose. Case in point: the film’s meet
cute involves him climbing into the overhead baggage area above where Heather
is sitting to get a bit of shut eye. His dazzling eyes and “deep” insights
allow him to reel in the young woman and before you know it, she’s thinking of
forever.
Well, it would be a really short film and a rather dull one
if they were to live happily ever after, so it comes as no surprise that Jack
has a SECRET! It’s a big one, which, of course, he cannot share with
Heather. Confusion is felt, tears are
shed and I rolled my eyes.
While I was happy once this predictable mess came to an end,
Hallstrom opts for an ending that’s far too abrupt. Perhaps he did so to alleviate our suffering
and, if that’s the case, I thank him. Yet narratively, it’s far from satisfying,
which, coupled with the lack of chemistry from the two leads, makes for a
rather tedious exercise. Granted, I am not the target audience for this
exercise, so really my opinion means nothing. I’d be willing to bet Map will
be Amazon Prime’s No. 1 film for the next 10 days, once the teens and 20-somethings start to sing its praises on social media. More power to them.
Let’s hope the algorithm that suggests movies similar to what they’ve watched
will be the map that leads them to something more substantial. Streaming on
Amazon Prime.
Nobody 2 delivers a bit more blood, a bit less fun
When you get down to it, Hutch Mansell is just like so many
suburban dads. He wants his family to
have everything he never had, so he works his fingers to the bone. Of course,
the tradeoff is that he’s seldom home, missing his son’s basketball games and
daughter’s school functions, upsetting his wife in the process. And he’s not
doing any better than the rest of us where facing this dilemma of the modern
American middle-class male is concerned. Isn’t it his job to provide for his
family? Don’t they just understand that
he’s working hard for them? What to do?
Of course, the one thing that separates Hutch from us
schmoes is that he’s an assassin, a killer working off a $30 million debt one
grisly assignment at a time. Bob Odenkirk was the secret weapon in making the
2021 Nobody a surprise hit and continues to be the key element in making
its sequel a worthy follow-up. The weariness and sense of resignation he brings
to his Everyman contract killer makes Hutch instantly relatable. And while most
of us will never be able to relate to John Wick, the fact that Hutch has a
mortgage payment to make and raise two teens makes him easy to identify and
sympathize with.
This aspect of the films’ premise is plumbed even further in
Nobody 2 when Hutch decides to take the crew on vacation. His wife,
Becca (Connie Nielsen), has reached the end of her rope where her husband’s
inability to find a proper work/life balance is concerned. So, he takes her,
the kids (Gage Munroe and Paisley Cadorath) and his dear old dad (Christopher
Lloyd) to Plummersville, Wisconsin. Far from being Disneyworld, it’s a place
with fond memories for Hutch, as it was the site of the one and only trip he,
his father and brother, Harry (RZA), ever took.
Needless to say, Plummersville has changed. While not one
improvement has been made to its amusement park in 40 years, the way the
town is run has. Near the Canadian border, it’s become a gateway for illegal
goods to enter the country. This operation is overseen by the foul-mouthed
Sheriff Abel (Colin Hanks), who’s under the thumb of the ruthless crime lord Ledina (Sharon Stone). An innocent misunderstanding leads Hutch to discover
this and when his family winds up being threatened…well, you know the rest…
Running a brisk 89 minutes, director Timo Tjahjanto doesn’t
give the viewer many opportunities to catch their breath. One elaborate set piece trips on the heels of
the next, breaks coming only when our hero issues threats or makes this bad
situation worse. Among the highlights is
a fight in an arcade in which a variety of games are turned into lethal weapons,
a confrontation in a warehouse that turns into an inferno and the final
showdown in the decrepit amusement park in which every attraction contains a
lethal booby trap.
The action is well-choreographed but far more gruesome than
in the first entry. This makes the
film’s darkly humorous moments a bit hard to swallow, though Stone makes up for
it with an over-the-top turn that’s a hoot. Much like Buster Keaton, Odenkirk
assumes a sense of resignation to the chaos that swirls about him. It’s a wise
approach that draws us in, connecting to our shared sense of helplessness in
the face of overwhelming odds and inexplicable events. But like any dad, Hutch puts his head down
and soldiers on. His path just happens to be a bit bloodier than ours. In theaters.
This article appears in Fall Guide 2025.
