Review by
Eric Hillis
Directed by: Matt Vesely
Starring: Lily Sullivan
There's a growing trend in recent years - no doubt exacerbated by the
restrictions of the COVID pandemic - for thrillers that feature a single
onscreen character communicating with an unseen supporting cast via a
phone or another audio communication device. Done well, as in the taut
Danish thriller
The Guilty
or the Tom Hardy vehicle
Locke, it can reap satisfying rewards, but there's always the argument to be
made that such storytelling is anti-cinematic and might just as well
work in the form of a radio play. Monolith, the debut feature of director Matt Vesely and writer
Lucy Campbell, features a single onscreen character communicating
verbally, but it stands out from other examples by managing to use
visual cues to further its story and character development.
Lily Sullivan, recently seen as the lead of
Evil Dead Rise, plays an unnamed character credited only as The Interviewer. The host
of a podcast named "Beyond Believable," she recently got into serious
trouble by accusing a man of a crime he was found not guilty of
committing. With an angry mob stationed outside her home, The
Interviewer relocates to the seclusion of her parents' home, one of
those modernist mansions with walls of glass that the villains of sci-fi
movies always seem to live in. Desperate for a story to revive her
damaged reputation, The Interviewer receives an anonymous email with a
phone number for a woman named Floramae and a brief mention of a brick.
The Interviewer calls the woman, who is initially confused until The
Interviewer mentions the brick. The woman goes on to tell the story of
how she was the housekeeper for a wealthy family until an incident in
which her daughter was blamed for damaging a table. At the same time she
received a strange present of a black brick from an unknown sender.
Believing it to be a piece of art, her employers took the brick as
compensation for the damage to the table and sold it to a German art
collector.
When The Interviewer contacts the collector, he claims he has several
of the bricks in his possession, and that 3D scans have revealed strange
symbols embedded within the bricks. With little more to go on, The
Interviewer posts an episode with this half-formed story, only to
receive multiple replies from people who have similarly received such
mysterious bricks. When she gets in touch with a few of these people,
The Interviewer learns that the arrival of the bricks always seems
connected to a dark time in each person's life, and some of them warn
her to stop pursuing the story for her own good.
The mystery expands as The Interviewer delves deeper, uncovering
connections to past events that seem to have been purposely buried. Even
if Vesely simply placed his camera on his leading lady's face for the
duration of the film, we'd be gripped by the mystery, which continually
draws us in with each new revelation.
But Vesely takes a far more cinematic approach than most filmmakers who
have dabbled in this increasingly popular format. Rather than simply
sitting at a desk, The Interviewer moves around her parents' large home
as she speaks on her cellphone. Vesely makes great use of the emptiness
of the space, and as the narrative grows more sinister in the second
half we get the sense that The Interviewer is in physical danger; we're
just not sure from what exactly. There's a chilling sequence in which
The Interviewer wakes up late in the morning after staying up all night
and clicks a remote to raise the home's automatic blinds. As we watch
the blinds slowly rise we're digging our nails into our armrests in
apprehension of what might be revealed to be lurking outside the home.
Even when The Interviewer is seated at her desk, Vesely cleverly uses
the device of showing us close-ups of audio waveforms as The Interviewer
records her conversations. Seeing the peaks, falls and empty spaces of
the waveforms makes for a telling visual representation of how the
person on the other end of the line is feeling.
Any film that revolves around a single character will ultimately
succeed or fail on the strength of the performer occupying that role.
Sullivan is magnificent as The Interviewer, evolving from cocksure and
confident to paranoid, nervous wreck as the mystery overwhelms her and
seems intent on wrapping her up in its enigmatic tentacles. By the end
of the movie you'll likely be sharing her unease.
Monolith is on UK/ROI VOD from
February 26th.
