Review:<\/p>\n
Gimmicks can be great when they\u2019re deployed as integral narrative tools. Although it became increasingly preposterous how cliffhangers had a habit of always occurring 59 minutes into each hour, \u201c24\u201d managed to get eight seasons out of its \u201cevents occur in real time\u201d format, and the Kiefer Sutherland series became more memorable because of it. The Ryan Reynolds thriller \u201cBuried\u201d took the idea of a single location thriller beyond being a purely economical way to make a movie, and made its coffin setting a key component of claustrophobic suspense that couldn\u2019t be generated any other way.<\/p>\n
Edited to look like it was shot entirely in one take, \u201cScurry\u201d has a gimmick too. What it doesn\u2019t have is a story that needs to be told as a 99-minute oner, compounding the problem of being uncompelling by also being leashed to a restrictive frame the fiction fails to benefit from.<\/p>\n
With a series of strange quakes causing chaos throughout the city, Mark becomes trapped underground at the start of \u201cScurry,\u201d simultaneously trapping unaware viewers inside an undercooked movie. Here is where Mark might be described to give a sense of his characterization, except there\u2019s nearly nothing to note. Later we learn he\u2019s a recovering alcoholic who feels like he let down his family, dropping a small seed to sprout a recyclable redemption arc. For now, all we know from a message he leaves his wife is that Mark fell in a hole before he was able to get to their kids. So, he\u2019s some sort of family man and that\u2019s about it, counting for the first two flat tires on \u201cScurry\u2019s\u201d clunky car.<\/p>\n
The other two tires have their air let out 12 minutes later, when Mark meets a woman named Kate who got caught in the same subterranean rubble. Equally underwhelming, Kate doubles the dullness with another hollow personality describable as abrasive and arrogant, two traits that are always impediments to audience engagement. Despite needing to survive the same predicament, Kate repeatedly pulls a gun on Mark to make him do what she wants, like retrieving a pill bottle she dropped. The two of them also trade sob stories during a respite, which completes the meager amount of basic background for the duo.<\/p>\n
Mark and Kate\u2019s situation requires crawling slowly through a long slog, desperate to find a literal light at the end of the tunnel that might offer escape, for them as well as for the weary souls on their couches still sticking it out until the end. Urging them on their way are spider-like creatures only briefly glimpsed in constant darkness, usually lit by the flickering flame of Mark\u2019s little lighter or a small camcorder screen.<\/p>\n
\u201cScurry\u201d can\u2019t capture the crushing helplessness of a choking underground environment in part because you can physically see that the main tunnel is an incomplete cylinder that\u2019s been cut so the camera can be beside them. If the movie were able to properly block shots instead of having to stay on one side due to the one-take setup, \u201cScurry\u201d would not only gain the ability to stage more cinematic action, it wouldn\u2019t be so visually uninteresting. The movie cuts off its own creativity by reducing the camera to a mere recording device rather than a conduit for crafting dynamic thrills.<\/p>\n
Every card in the deck is stacked against \u201cScurry,\u201d but that\u2019s by its own unfortunate design. The movie\u2019s misuse of the oner isn\u2019t conceptually clever; it\u2019s an active hindrance to creating an immersive setting and doesn\u2019t make sense for the paper-thin premise. It\u2019s already a tall order to task two actors with carrying a whole show on their backs, but with one of those actors having no previous feature film experience, they don\u2019t possess the presence or the chemistry necessary to energize a lethargic vibe. Factor in darkened imagery that feels like what it is, a pair of people crammed into a cramped space for an overlong amount of time, and it becomes impossible to find a hook that makes the movie worth watching.<\/p>\n
Cursory characters. Languid pacing. Nonexistent suspense. \u201cScurry\u2019s\u201d experiment to disguise a bland B-movie as a one-take thriller bursts every flask in the lab, and there\u2019s no buoy to save viewers from drowning in the drabness.<\/p>\n
Review Score: 25<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Review: Gimmicks can be great when they\u2019re deployed as integral narrative tools. Although it became increasingly preposterous how…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":488015,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-488014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}