THE DAY FILM REVIEW

Review by Trevor Parker on
http://www.fangoria.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5674:the-day-tiff-film-review&catid=50:movies-tv&Itemid=181

Don’t seek out THE DAY expecting some sort of innovative take on the future-dystopia genre. You’ll already be familiar with the basic plot and omnipresent cloud of danger from THE ROAD, the bleached, oversaturated photography from THE BOOK OF ELI, the nighttime farmhouse siege from NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (yep, it’s another “ragtag crew defending an enclosed locale against an evil mob” trip). Even a crumb of THE ROAD WARRIOR is incorporated via a lead baddie with a mohawk. Since nothing here comes off as particularly original, director Aarniokoski (who cut his filmic teeth shooting 2nd unit on a number of Robert Rodriquez’s movies) wisely expends his energy and running time on the interplay between his characters.

These scenes let THE DAY’s most compelling asset, the excellent and admirably committed cast, stretch and impress. Underrated Ashmore follows up his fine work in Adam Green’s FROZEN by tapping into emotional darkness once again for his role of a family man adrift in grief, yet the film is stolen outright by THE LAST EXORCISM’s Bell. The waifish actress has to be the most unexpectedly credible action heroine in years; her character Mary is a grotty, haggard and vulnerable alternative to the sterile and blowdried perfection of, say, Kate Beckinsale in the UNDERWORLD series. Bell’s emaciated, almost skeletal face (superb, subtle makeup job here) haunts the screen, and she makes sure every line of Mary’s limited dialogue holds a weary weight. Aarniokoski and screenwriter Luke Passmore engender a rare level of realism for female fighters by not having the slight, wispy girl easily overpower hordes of burly mesomorphic stuntmen; Bell is appropriately bounced and tossed around like chicken in a skillet, making her eventual victories feel that much more earned.

Shame, then, that many of the film’s manic action sequences are defaced by some tragically blotchy digital blood and weapons. Crap CGI is quickly becoming the modern equivalent of a boom mic drooping into frame; it startles the viewer out of the film, and here the effects are distractingly phony enough to cause the flow of some otherwise blood-pumping action to stutter.

U.S. distribution for THE DAY has been acquired by WWE Studios, no doubt based on the strength of the performances and Bell’s memorable star turn. If the company can somehow smuggle the film’s brutal but necessary violence past the MPAA (especially if they manage to keep a pulverizing kitchen confrontation between Ashmore and Bell intact), this will certainly be a DAY worth waiting for.