Review of The Signal (2014) by Brett B — 31 Aug 2014

THE SIGNAL is a special kind of frustrating film because you can see the potential was there for something great. It's shot well, the dialogue is unusually literate for a genre piece, the acting is good, and there are some wonderful moments.

.. but it gets just too cute and pretentious for its own good. It also has a truly peculiar structure, with a genuinely fresh and inventive initial premise in its first act that keeps you guessing what genre we're even in; it's a terrific first 20 minutes, but the movie trips up in spectacular fashion with a second act that stops the momentum dead in its tracks (with a time jump forward that leaves us feeling like we've skipped over the really interesting movie).

From there, we launch into a third act this is equally disconnected and disjointed, like we're seeing three smaller films stitched together in the cinematic equivalent of the Frankenstein Monster.

Additionally - and perhaps the film's biggest problem - the movie crams in far too many mysteries and questions that go unanswered. There's a fine line between being ambiguous in an engaging way and being willfully oblique, and the filmmakers have seen fit to come down in the side of being needlessly murky, something which makes the whole affair feel rather unsatisfying.

All that said, there is some wonderful character work on display, as well as some quite haunting and lovely imagery, but these things are not enough to push the film over the top. And that's not even touching upon the ending, which is straight out of the TWILIGHT ZONE playbook.

.. but not in a good way.