Review: The Vast Of Night

-

 Something's in the sky.


In a small town in New Mexico in 1958, everyone has packed into the high school to watch a basketball game. Mostly everyone, young nerdy radio DJ, Everett (Jake Horowitz) is out walking with his friend and town switchboard operator Fay (Sierra McCormick) before they separate to do their jobs. While Fay is listening to Everett's show, she catches a strange frequency through the radio and phones Everett. When he broadcasts it on his show, he receives a strange call with an even stranger story and it sends these two on a mysterious mission.

We jump right into Everett and Fay's dynamic. The opening scene, showing the two teens leaving the school, testing out Fay's new tape recorder, then heading to their jobs is very dialogue heavy and thankfully these two have excellent banter. I was surprised to find out this movie wasn't originally a radio play to be honest. This film is very much "tell" over "show." The majority of the information that drives the plot comes from two separate stories that characters are telling, plus these two working it out back and forth. I think this works well, but it also plays into the films biggest problem.

This is director Andrew Patterson's first feature and I know I want to see more from him. Story wise, this is great. The production design is excellent, he pays a lot of homage to The Twilight Zone, which is fitting, but because he has these long stretches of dialogue, it almost feels like he didn't know quite how to shoot them. So many scenes are just dark and unfocused and sometimes the camera cuts to a completely black screen instead of just focusing on the actor listening to what is being told. It feels like a very insecure move for a film that gets everything else about the setting right. Why not let the camera linger on your actors?

Those choices aside, I thought this was a solid little sci fi story. The film is only 90 minutes and breezes right by. It's available to stream on Amazon Prime. 

Recommended: Yes

Grade: B

Memorable Quote: "I just got nervous again." - Fay (Sierra McCormick)

Comments

  1. DellOctober 6, 2020 at 5:54 PM

    Sounds interesting, but I'll be honest. Saying it's mostly telling and not showing might keep me away for awhile.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 7, 2020 at 6:36 AM

      To be fair, I don't think this film had the budget to show, but the tell is good enough to make up for it when the director isn't randomly cutting to black.

      Delete
  2. thevoid99October 6, 2020 at 6:57 PM

    I heard a lot of good things about this film as I'm eager to check it out. Especially to see Creepy Connie do more roles like this as I hear she's taking on some meaty parts.

    ReplyDelete
  3. keith71_98October 7, 2020 at 12:07 AM

    I LOVE this movie. I actually had the opportunity to see it last year and it ended up making my Top 10. The old school nostalgia and Twilight Zone vibes (which you noticed too)...I ate that stuff up. And I thought Sierra was terrific.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamOctober 7, 2020 at 6:35 AM

      I remember! Sierra was great and this was a really promising debut. I just hope the director loses those "dead space" issues.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Thanks for stopping by, let's talk movies!
(comments are moderated to reduce spam)

Popular posts from this blog

Random Ramblings: The Radio Flyer Conundrum

-
Image
Recently, I was talking to someone about who I thought were the best child actors when I was also a child.  Two that really stood out to me were Elijah Wood and Joseph Mazello, and one film those two were in together was called Radio Flyer.  Then I was reminded about the uniqueness of this film. Instead of reviewing the film, I wanted to have an open discussion about the ending. It deals with a tough issue; child abuse. What I’ve noticed is the way that the film ends is interpreted many different ways, and the filmmakers never came forward to say what was right and wrong. I’m interested in hearing everyone’s opinions on it. How did you interpret the ending? Obviously spoiler alerts will follow.. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, the basic premise is this: Two young boys, Mikey (Wood) and Bobby (Mazello) move in with their single mother and her boyfriend, who refers to himself as ‘The King’. It doesn’t take long for The King to start physically abusing Bobby, and the
Read more

Indie Gems: Behind The Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

-
Image
Passionate about your profession? I had never heard of this film until it ended up on one of Jason's favorite horror movie lists around Halloween. It immediately sounded interesting to me, so of course I threw it in my Netflix queue. (and if I'm just now watching it after adding it around Halloween, you know how ridiculous my queue is) Taylor (Angela Goethals) is a journalist who, along with a film crew decides to follow around a serial killer named Leslie Vernon. (Nathan Baesel) He plans on doing the typical slasher thing - getting a bunch of drunk teens in an abandoned house and knocking them off one by one. He gets advice from a retired serial killer, Eugene (Scott Wilson) and is threatened by a man who's on to him, Doc Holloran (Robert Englund) Taylor and crew are there capturing it all. Leslie Vernon is fucking hilarious to start with, and clearly very passionate about what he does. He tells Taylor all of his secrets and can barely contain his excitemen
Read more

Please join me in my Favorite Movie Titles Blogathon!

-
Image
Earlier this week I made a post where I ran through the letters of the alphabet with my favorite movie titles. There were a few people that suggested I turn it into a blogathon, and I've never done that before. So here goes nothing! Since this is my first attempt at a blogathon, it's all pretty simple, and it's hopefully a quick post that everyone can join in. Rules: 1) Going through the alphabet, list your favorite movie title beginning with each letter.  2) You don't have to necessarily  like the movie to use it's title.  3) Use the banner at the top of this post in yours. 4) Please have submissions in by Friday, May 30th*. (But I'll be honest, if you send them to me after that date, I'll still add them to my post.) You can either leave a link to your post in the comments here or tweet it to me, ( @ramblingfilm )  Thanks everyone! :)  *I had to move the date back a week due to Photobucket threatening me with bandwidth issues. But
Read more