Review of Surveillance (2008) by Lisa J — 19 Aug 2011

Surveillance is a film that involves the investigation into a missing girl and several murders that have occurred recently. The FBI is called in to handle the situation in hopes of putting the matter to rest quickly. When the FBI is called in it unravels the mystery one gruesome step at a time. The acting was decent and the direction was good as was the script. It was an overall solid film but it was still lacking in some areas that could have been easily fixable.

The direction by Jennifer Lynch (Boxing Helena) was very good. She was able to pull most of what she needed out of her relatively unknown cast. Though there were some parts of the film I question because of the lack of emotional depth the actors were able to achieve, but I believe that this could probably be blamed on the acting crew. She still did a good job but letting this flaw present itself is her responsibility to get the most out of her actors which she failed to do in this case, but it didn't hurt the film as much as it could have.

The script, also by Jennifer Lynch, was good. It represented a humanistic dark nature that very few films are able to possess and still have a good story base. The shear nature of the killings is brutal and animalistic yet the killers are portrayed as being very sociable, a very scary thought. But the overall plot was very deceiving and only let in the light little by little, creating a who done it style of new age murders. Of course eventually when everything comes to the surface, the typical viewer will be very surprised. It is a very good script that leaves the viewer pleased.

The acting was decent. Bill Pullman (You Kill Me) was the lead of the group and fell a little short in the emotional category. He was his usual self and remained withdrawn from the people around him, which was good in a way because of his character, but it was also bad in a way because it showed his shallowness and inability to show emotion as an actor. Julia Ormond (I Know Who Killed Me) did a good job but had similar difficulty with the rest of the cast showing any true emotion that would have enabled her to reach a new level of ability. Nonetheless her performance was adequate to the part she was playing and overall did a good job opposite her partner. The supporting cast members, consisting of French Stewart (The Flock), Pell James (Zodiac), and Michael Ironside (The Alphabet Killer), all of whom did very well in their respective roles. For the most part the chemistry was right on although there were some scenes that felt a little forced at times. Usually it was the more intense parts of the film but was still well perceived overall.

Surveillance was a film surrounding the spree murders of two serial killers. It was better than average because of the script which could have been made better by a few adjustments to the acting crew, who were not terrible but were at times off the mark. The direction was good but still could have tweaked a little for a better film. Even with these few flaws the overall film concept was a good one and with a little more backing could have put some of these other poor excuses for thrillers to shame.