Review: YOU'LL NEVER FIND ME

A remote flat roofed house in a thunderstorm. The man inside toys with a glass of whisky. A knock at the door. He's hostile, telling whoever it is to fuck off. The knocking persists and he cautiously opens the door. A young woman is outside, asking if he'll give her a lift or let her use his phone. Begrudgingly, he lets her in. He tells her he doesn't have a phone and his car is playing up so she's out of luck there but he does giver her a pocketful of coins for the payphone at the edge of the gated community. The phone is a hike away. Or she can have the couch. There is a slowly mounting sense of dread in the air. As the trust-establishing dialogue progresses and curiosity-stirring movements ensue we are taken on a strange trip between these two and what this encounter might turn out to mean.

This is a two hander. The third narrative force is the punishing weather which rages throughout the running time, turning down or up according to the action. The shooting style is a series of variations on shot reverse shot, kept mostly loose to avoid gimmickry, and we get the feeling that what begins as a kind of stiff dialogue transforms into more of an interview or even interrogation. If it is the latter (and it can feel like it) it stays shy of hard definition; there are no accusations or questions too leading but the persistent information-gathering nature of the back and forth is constant. The fourth narrative force is the  crafting of the dialogue itself which goes from alienatingly awkward to fluid and engaging, icy to burning.

Both Brendan Rock and Jordan Cowan have to hold this difficult gig aloft for a hair over ninety minutes and this is where flaws appear. This is less to do with their skills at emoting or emotional inertia than the scheme their performances must progress. The second act feels overlong, dawdling while the audience is busy guessing the end, which detracts from the explosive climax just enough to diminish its power from surprise. Nevertheless, if a film like this with its difficult brief commits only the sin of a draggy middle act, it's not doing so badly.

You'll Never Find Me is in a kind of limbo. It's the short film you feel needed to be longer to realise its potential. It's the feature that needs to be a little trimmer. However, its cinematic hand prevents it from feeling stagey and use of highly evocative exteriors and a developing motif from a different setting (which does let us know probably more than we should) build its world which might well not be the one we were introduced to. One of its strengths is a refusal to blatantly explain this and it ends on a note, in the dark, as its audience is, showing only what happened. That, finally, is what gives it its lift.

Viewing notes: I saw this as part of MIFF and ACMI's encore screenings (like last week's Monotlith. There was a brief introduction but Q and A with filmmakers afterwards which means no information on further distribution. As with Monolith, I would hope we see it in cinemas at some point and would happily see it on a streamer like Stan or Shudder.