I like to try to support films that are outside of the mainstream as much as I can but unfortunately, most of the time, there are very good reasons why they are out of the mainstream with unknown directors and writers at the helm as well as actors that if you have heard of them at all, it is for something really minor. I don't even know why most of them are made because the chances that they are actually going to turn a profit is normally pretty slim.
Barron's Cove has a promising premise and that is what drew me in, in the first place.
After his son is tragically killed, a grieving father with a history of violence kidnaps the child responsible, igniting a frenzied manhunt fueled by a powerful politician, the father of the kidnapped boy.
There are rules in films about hurting or killing children. I don't know if it is a law or just considered taboo by the industry, but its something you don't often see so when someone makes a screenplay about a film where children are going to have to be the subject of harm, I suppose that is part of the reason why this screenplay sat on a shelf for years before being picked up by a minor independent film distributor.
While I can't say for certain, I seriously doubt that this saw any sort of major rotation at cinemas.
The story is pretty compelling because an enraged father who happens to have a "specific set of skills" is well, something you have heard of before. But for him to use those skills to kidnap another kid is what makes this film unique. Then the story starts to unfold and thicken I suppose but for me at least, this is where it stopped being very interesting because almost all of what happens is completely implausible.
"Caleb" is the enraged father in question here and his son, Barron, is in almost none of the film. Caleb is played by Garrett Hedlund and he has some acting chops but comes across as, well I don't really know how to describe it but it seems more than a bit cringe in many of the scenes, so much so that at times I skipped the film ahead just to not have to endure it anymore.
There's only so much "super angry dad guy" screaming his way through his lines that I can tolerate, honestly.
The film does take some rather interesting and unexpected twists, which is good and rare for a USA production, but I'm afraid that what happens after the twists are revealed just isn't good enough and I suspect that they were rewrites to cater to a specific producer rather than what the original story called for. If you watch this film you can probably guess what the original story probably was, and that would have been far more gruesome and more like a Korean thriller, which I believe are the best thrillers in the world.
Another aspect of this film that was always going to get under my skin and perhaps others is the prevalence of child actors in it. There are several but the person who takes up a lot of screentime is the body "Ethan" who is played by Christian Convery who you might recognize from a show called Sweet Tooth.
I don't necessarily think that this performance is Convery's fault, but the time that he is on screen is more annoying than endearing like it is meant to be. This was a big ask of a young actor who has to be a wide range of things from whiny, vicious, caring, and also cunning throughout the film and in the end I mostly just wanted him to be on screen less but then again, I wanted this entire film to be about 30 minutes shorter than it was.
The list of implausible occurrences in this film are many and all of them have to happen in order for the film to go on at all but i'll be vague while still listing a few of them.
Ethan is kidnapped from an expensive private school in broad daylight in what appears to be a rather effortless action. This would be almost impossible and would make international news immediately.
It is known by everyone who kidnapped Ethan yet everyone seems pretty relaxed about actually finding him or Caleb even though everyone knows it is them. In reality the resources used to find them would be inexhaustible and would involve vast numbers of officers - not just the local cops and a single detective
There are other instances where Caleb gains access to secure places and it isn't explained how he is able to pull this off. He's just there all of a sudden. In the the film Taken every step of the process is explained and that is what made that film great. In this movie, we are just supposed to take them at their word that Caleb can do that because: Reasons.
While on the run Caleb paints over the construction logo on the side of his van so his vehicle wont be ID'd by anyone. It works. Ridiculous
Should I watch it?
That's a well-made trailer and it is put together so well that it actually convinced me to watch it. Unfortunately the actual film isn't anywhere near as good as that trailer is. I think that too much stress was placed on the individual actors and we just kind of cry and wall-punch our way through a script that is honestly too long for the story being told. I can't watch a person get all weepy about the same thing dozens of times in a row regardless of how traumatizing the event in question actually is meant to be. That's one of the greatest flaws of this film. The sorry that is meant to be experienced by the characters in the film is focused on to the point of numbness on the part of the audience.
This film easily could have been 30 minutes or more shorter than it is and the repetition of scenarios is also a weak point.
The main actors involved are not terrible actors: I'm not trying to say that. I just think that this screenplay was poorly executed as a film and some mistakes were made that had they been eliminated or perhaps kept the way that the original author of the screenplay intended, there is actually a pretty fantastic story in there. They were SO CLOSE to making a korean-esque thriller but instead wimped-out and changed it into a feelgood movie. This is what I take away from watching it anyway. It could have been something great but instead it is just another indie film trying to wear big boy pants and failing at doing so.
That being said there are some good scenes in this and if you are at a loss of what to watch you could see this one, remote in hand to skip almost all the scenes where Ethan and Caleb are alone.
There is currently no legal way to stream this as part of a subscription. It can be rented on many different platforms including Apple and Prime for around $6.
