What Comes Around

At first I thought this was a solid,muscular acted drama about a young teenage girl finding friendship then ' love' with a much older guy on the internet and the ramifications of how the internet can foster vulnerable girls into falling with much older men.

Cue a talky , arguments about the mother finding out and the girl expressing her love for this chap- who is old enough to know better... However, it doesn't really go down that way, a twist occurs mid way through that spins the entire film around completely.

This is a short,lean drama, clearly based on a play that gives weighty themes to adult responsibilities, childhood in peril and the sins of the past. Good performances around especially Kyle Gallner- my second film this week I've seen him in after 'The Passenger'; he's turning into an actor to watch.

A thought provoking and well made drama.

I just don't want you to get hurt.

Then why are you hurting me?!

Anna is almost 17 and nearly half the age of the strange man at the door. "I love him" Anna says, "he just gets me." However, Anna's mother Beth and her fiancé, the chief of police, are not so convinced. It isn't long before they are all in a shouting match. "Get out of my house!" Beth screams. Emotions are running high at the start, but they are turned up many more notches before all is said and done.

I thought I knew what was going to happen in Roost, but I was so wrong. There are twists to the turns, and reversals to the turnarounds. Roost is so tense and timely. Summer Phoenix (Beth) and Grace Van Dien (Anna), who is from the Robert Mitchum family, do not let their famous relatives down.

"This is what happens when you don't deal with your stuff," said director Amy Redford who was present at this Toronto International Film Festival world premiere screening. She did such a good job of highlighting that there is good and bad, perils and possibilities, in each of us. She claimed that not understanding her own child aided her in directing this film. "Listening and understanding help us get to a better place" she said, "honesty is always age appropriate."

A couple interesting twists, but the acting by Summer Phoenix is so so bad that there is no chance for this movie to be taken seriously. Grace Van Dien tries and plays the role well enough. Kyle Gallner shines here. With better dialogue and acting, this could have been a really successful psychological thriller. As it stands though, it's a dark and twisty Hallmark movie. I have to keep writing about this movie, so I will mention that Anna's outfit choices are interesting. Maybe this is how some teens dress these days, but I saw a lot of outfits that read professor/librarian, which felt off. And that's all I have to say about that.

An attemp at a shocking thriller unfortunately turns into a lengthy, dull and plain film with plenty of cliches and repetitive tropes. The story itself had a nice simple (although not original) plot twist that sadly got lost in completely ordinary unsophisticated script. I am not saying that to make a good film you need to present an extremely complicated story, but when you do have a simple tale you have to grab the viewer's attention with other elements like a solid script or engaging cinematography and production design - all of which this picture lacks. Yet the biggest downfall (out of many) of What Comes Around is its incredibly weak acting performances. The rising Grace Van Dien (Stranger Things) just could not capture the protagonists's personality believably and her portrayal felt deeply artificial and in some scenes even ridiculous.

There is much to like with this movie. Grace Van Dien and the ever excellent Kyle Gallner are the two best reasons to watch this movie. Both are utterly convincing in their roles.

The direction and the editing, on the the other hand are, well, sub standard, is the polite way to say it. Some shots are dwelt on for too long and some of the scenes feel that they are 'acted' rather than having two people having a real conversation. The other actors are quite awful.

There is a nice little plot twist that comes in about half an hour into the movie that stops it falling into a schmaltzy Hallmark type movie.

Is it worth a watch? Kind of, but with some reservations.