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(2012) Pressed THRILLER

Co- written, co-produced and directed by Justin Donnelly directing yet an unsatisfying, strictly-by-the book with no new surprises, straight-to-rental movie regarding spontaneous circumstances starring Luke Goss as Brian who's just gotten the boot from his previous job, something to do with advertising. Afraid to notify his wife about it, Brian decides to sulk his sorrows by drinking at a bar only to find out that one of his old school chums happens to be the owner of the bar he was drinking in. To lift Brian's spirits up, he offers him a gambling deal of a sure thing by tripling his money for him from 500 dollars to 5,000. Feeling so high and mighty, Brian then scrounges up a hundred grand of his own money, only to find out later that his bar owner friend was intending to invest it into the drug trade. And everything goes downhill from here as soon as a couple of precocious teenagers stole the charger where the hundred grand was stored in. Take my word for it, things really do get worst from here, and they don't get any better. You know, if you're a frequent newspaper and magazine reader, and news watcher, you would very well know that whatever 'negative' happens in this film is the kind of stuff people read and hear about all the time, so why do we need to watch it as a movie one might ask. It's because there's still an audience for these type of movies where they're many 'narrow minded' people who chose to not keep themselves inform about what is happening in today's society, and rather tweet, twitter and gossip with users on facebook with perfect strangers and don't seem to care about anything else. The thing is that not everything that is shown on the news is a sad story often stereotypically suggested. Also, they're hundreds of better films that almost uses this exact same scenario which makes one to wonder, whether or not the makers/ writers of this movie came up with the story by reading it from some article, or had seen someone else doing a better job of it. Bomb.

I think this is another fine, low-budget Canadian movie. Well shot and performed, with real-life characters and situations, the former being accurately depicted. It's a just stuck-in-a-bad-situation-getting-worser-and-worser case, but with a refreshing point of view. The storyline is original, the cast delivers an excellent job, Luke Goss has charisma and Donnelly's directorial style is effective. Not outstanding, but definitely well worth a watch. It's the kind of small movie with no artistic ambitions, nonetheless fueled with talent and passion. After "Gunless", another good example of highly-entertaining feature film.

When you start hitting the fast-forward button while watching a movie, you might as well turn it off and watch something else. So it goes with Pressed. When is something going to happen? You wait, and you wait.

Here's my brief summary:

Laid-off white collar sales director Brian finds his way to a dive bar. He hasn't told his wife yet that he got fired; she is out of town with their toddler. The bar owner chats it up with Brian, then proposes a get-rich-quick scheme. Brian only needs to invest his last $100,000. He needs to bring the money in cash, in the proverbial briefcase. They will both have more than enough money when the deal is completed.

Somehow two joy-riding high schoolers find their way into the story. The only problem is that the Director (or screen writer) of this film takes forever to bring the kids face to face with Brian. You feel like you are watching two separate movies. When they do meet up, the story becomes too bizarre to be believed.

And the ending? I won't spoil it for you, other than to say that it leaves you with a pile of unanswered questions. (I watched two different versions of this movie on YouTube, thinking the first one had edited out part of the ending. It hadn't).

I rate Pressed "5" for the great scenery and camera work. I cannot recommend that you watch it.

OK, Matt Goss puts up a good show of being a young exec on the way down. And when he's tempted into easy money in a bar, we can believe it. But luck would have it that a couple of kids steal a car containing the deal money. Me, I'd be out of there, but these dumb brats somehow (didn't get how) find themselves speaking to Matt on the phone and agree to meet him, later to try and get the money back on the car and electronics they've bought. Are they mad? Why would they do that? I was OK with the first three-quarters of the story, then it goes into Alice in Wonderland territory - yet Matt maintains his serious expression to the end. Masterful! In conclusion: an unconvincing story makes a dreadful movie.

01/13/2019 Proof that even big names like Luke Goss can NOT lift a bad storyline. Dull, dead from the start and never improves, not even the unsatisfying ending i.e. "Waste of viewers time". Bon Appetit