Review of Coherence (2014) by Devin H — 04 Sep 2014

COHERENCE is almost a masterpiece. It comes incredibly close to being a near-flawless work of low budget science fiction, with a tremendous, TWILIGHT ZONEian central premise, great acting, and a truly inventive screenplay.

The story - which begins with an innocuous dinner party among friends on the night a rare comet is passing over - quickly escalates into far stranger territory, but to reveal anything else would do the intricately constructed script a huge disservice.

This is the best kind of puzzle movie, a constantly engaging ride that values ideas and characters above all. Our group of characters are instantly likable and convincing, which allows us to fully buy into the weirdness that eventually does unfold, and the film is shot in a pseudo-verite, almost docudrama-ish style that works really well as a device to heighten the tension and the mystery.

The character writing is particularly strong, as well, and it's truly refreshing to see people reacting (more or less) rationally and intelligently to an extraordinary situation. From a plotting perspective, the whole thing is quite beautifully and tightly constructed, slowly revealing more and more complex layers as we move along, while also being easy to follow.

The film does take a misstep (a somewhat serious one, in my opinion) with a particular turn around the third act, a misstep that I do think undermines the movie as a whole. To go into it would mean serious spoilers, so I won't, and I suppose it's possible that people will be happy to go along with this particular development, but it feels out of place on an emotional level, even though an argument could be made that it does feel - thematically - of a piece with the character arc of one of the leads.

That (somewhat significant) nitpick aside, COHERENCE is an energizing piece of sci-fi that I'm sure I'll be returning to in the future. It's one of the most original films of 2014.