Paramount

PG 13. 103 min

Well we are still in the post Oscar wasteland so it's not easy to find diamonds in the rough. Oft-times I will take a shot at something because of a relationship with an actor or a director I've come to respect. Now I admit that JJ Abrams is only the producer, not the director, of CLOVERFIELD but it does star John Goodman. Apparently this one has been sitting on the shelf for a while because star Goodman is still at his top weight before shedding all those pounds, so I'm not positive if the similarity between this and recent Oscar nominee ROOM is a coincidence.

From that you may have guessed that this is another one of those one set films and takes place in an enclosed shelter with one character playing the part of jailer.

Of course the situations are quite different.

Her romantic life in ruins, Michelle is driving away to god-knows-where when her truck is run off the road and crashes into a ditch. She wakes up in a cinder-block room chained to a cot provided by a very unlikely caretaker, Howard. (Goodman )

He relates an incredible story of an enemy attack which has left the air outside poison and explains to her that staying within the shelter is her only chance to survive.

She and her fellow captive Emmett are almost positive Howard is crazy and this story is completely insane. Almost. As time goes by the prisoners start to wonder if there isn't really something going on outside but even so their resolve to escape grows stronger.

So it's a series of vignettes centered around escape attempts and communicating with Howard trying to separate reality from fantasy.

Sure, he's weird but is he nuts? That's what the audience finds out when the climax finally comes to pass. I'm not sure you could call it a big surprise but it's certainly something from the M Night Shamalan playbook, and if that sounds like I have 'damned with faint praise' here, that's probably true.

C

WSS