The Integrity of Joseph Chambers

I am rarely this negative on a movie, but the fact that all those reviews that gave this a great rating got me suckered into wasting my time watching this...? Don't be fooled like I was!

This movie simply is not working h the time it takes to watch. It is one of the SLOWEST moving movies that I have ever seen! And it's not like a "Good" slow, either. You know, the kinda that actually rewards your anticipation with a great scene. Nope. This movie is literally filled with scenes that drag on, and on, and on, and on... and the fact that there is hardly ANY dialogue going on in this movie only makes these scenes MORE brutal! It truly feels like the film maker was just trying to fill in a bunch of "dead time" to make this movie as long as it is. Because honestly, this story could have been told 20-30 minutes.

What an utter waste of time. Don't bother!

As you can see I have very mixed feelings about this curate's egg.

The set up is great. A city boy has married a country girl and wants to prove that he can go hunting in local woods in his own Alexander Supertramp moment. He has no experience, no idea and no chance of success. Every stumble over a twig or branch is torture. His fumbling loading of the gun is cringeworthy. The ease with which he gets distracted is mind numbing.

I won't say how all this plays out but we can see it coming a mile away. This is mostly because of the interminable slow pace of the film which will have the average viewer anxiously looking at their watch fro a half hour in.

Could have been a short story.

A family man, hoping to prove his survivalist capabilities and manliness to his family, decides to irresponsibly head off into the woods and go deer hunting by himself.

The second feature narrative I saw at Southern Screen and it was intriguing if for no other reason that the trailers kept it pretty shady as far as what actually ends up happening. This set up has plenty of potential so as long as it wasn't just a man walking around the woods with no shake-ups at all I assumed I'd like it all right. Thankfully something DOES happen.... but not much.

My friend watching this movie with me at one points in the first third said "I guess this is a slow burn" and he wasn't kidding because everything in this movie is slow. And that's mostly because they show nearly everything that happens and then hold on every shot FOREVER. Somewhere out there there is a 40 minute cut of this 1h36m movie and it changes nothing about the story. We see very little but him doing mundane tasks for the first half; getting ready, walking through the woods, looking around, walking through the woods some more, etc. Many of these are long takes which would be impressive if more was actually happening.

Highlighting that is the very misguided sound mixing. I'm guessing in post they realized the film didn't have much to hold interest for these incredibly long moments so they decided to jazz it up with some loud music stings and overbearing score moments. They feel like they are trying to convert what's happening on screen as something alarming. Just when you think nothings gonna happen 🎵 DUN-DUN! 🎶....nothing happens. They all feel like purposeful ruses to keep you awake. "Be scared by this!" Other times I wanted spoken moments louder or at the very least to have subtitles to understand the whispery deliveries.

Near the halfway mark we finally get our shake-up moment that gives this some actual stakes. I won't spoil it much but it does give our main character a moral dilemma to grapple with. However it does come with its own annoyances and moments where characters make odd decisions "just because."

Switching to some positives, I have to give props to Clayne Crawford who basically has to hold the film together. If his performance had been subpar I don't think the film would be worth anything but he has to hold the camera for pretty much the entire film. He has to convey most of his emotions with very little dialogueI, and any time it is spoken he has the task of trying to make talking to yourself look realistic. I also like the moments where Joe is reenacting something in his head and we hear what he hears. At one point he is throwing dirt clod in the woods imagining he's pitching at the World Series and we actually hear the crowds cheering and other sfx. It's a relatable peek into his mind, a nice way of showing it, and feeds into his insecurities about how he sees himself. He's a guy who wants to be taken seriously and prove he can provide outside of his career as an insurance salesman, this being the reasoning behind why he takes off on this solo hunting venture in the first place.

When faced with two choices the movie does ultimately end up going the direction I was hoping for but there were still plenty of other routes I was hoping for prior to that. While the integrity of the title character can be admired, the movie as a whole still leaves much to be desired.

Insurance Salesman Joe decides to champion his inner Bear Grylls and challenge his surgical skills in the wild. Armed with a rifle, he aims to shoot a deer.

This surprised me somewhat, I rather enjoyed it, a story of foolishness and trying to prove a point. It doesn't go as I expected, which is in its favour. Pacing has been pointed out by several as an issue, but if argue it's purposefully slow, feeling as though it was done in real time, it doesn't lurch from one action scene to the next. Efforts were made to make the film seem realistic.

A film about masculinity, it actually made for something of a change to the recent films I've seen, where masculinity is simply deemed bad, here it does at least explore and question it.

Considering Clayne Crawford does most of the film solo, he does a pretty fine job, a good performance.

Overall, this was much better than I expected.

7/10.

Joseph Chambers sells insurance for a living and he apparently makes a good living doing so. He is seen at the start of the story dressing up for a solo hunting adventure, much to the displeasure of his wife. Against her wise advice, the city slicker borrows a deer rifle from a friend for his first expedition.

His trek eventually turns out badly and the second half of the movie has Joseph making a few important decisions.

His future is dependent upon what moral choices he will ultimately make. Clayne Crawford is on screen alone for most of the film and he is excellent as Joseph Chambers. Will he or won't he do what is right?