Lost in Plainview

To me when I was watching this movie, it seemed like a bad remake of Steven Spielberg's "Duel" With the psycho truck driver. Only now its a cop, and instead of one guy, its two girls.

This movie as whole was just bad, the acting wasn't good, the dialog was poorly written, and it was pretty predictable from time to time. And I think one of the reasons for the predictability is that they started it with the end, but didn't do it properly like "The Usual Suspects" or "Memento" which still left you guessing as to everything else even when you got to that scene.

My recommendation is to stay far from watching this movie.

Let me count the number of reviews for this baby, first. Then we'll list the problems.

Reviews: one. It's neither an honor nor a privilege to be the second. But here goes anyway.

The first problem presents itself right away. The dark-haired girl, the second of the main characters, is pretty to look at, yet repulsive. Unlikeable from the get-go, her character is annoying and dooms this film before it's barely started.

How about some good points? Production values are not horrible, and they DO zip around a desert-y landscape, in the daylight, which is probably the only reason I watched this entire film. Also, the villain drives a Camaro with authentic motor sounds, not dubbed in phonies.

And before I waste any more time writing about this movie that was apparently seen by only myself and a few others, let me tell you that the climactic scene is a physical impossibility, yet edited to try to make us think it DID happen that way.

So, dear viewer, rent this flick only if, number one, it's a freebie, and number two, if there is something wrong with you.

Acting and story could be better, but this is so much better than what most of this level of filmmakers can achieve two decades after it was made.

Full disclosure: I was at this film's premiere in 2004 because my uncle is one of the producers. I remember it being pretty terrific.

Rewatching nearly two decades later, the issues with it are much clearer. The movie was made in a time when not everyone made films or could call themselves a filmmaker. Nowadays it's hard to find something even as decent as this among the over saturation of content that creators aspiring to be real filmmakers are pushing out.

Other than some performances and some of the story the movie is halfway decent. It's something like Breakdown meets Wolf Creek but in the California desert. I will say there was too many slow motion sequences that were not shot at a higher frame rate and that lessens the production value of this picture unfortunately.

The original title Lost in Plainview (and poster) better represent what this movie is. This movie is by no means as bad as the trailer I've seen for it, but it could be a lot better. But that is by today's standards. For indie filmmakers in the mid 2000s, this isn't half bad.