By Simon Thompson
If there is one thing that I enjoy it’s a good seat-movingly tense thriller where even though what I’m watching is giving me stabbing heart palpitations yet I still can’t help but continue to watch. This is a feeling which writer/director Will Higo provides in spades with his movie The Group, a movie which I could best describe tonally as being an ice cream sandwich of Requiem For A Dream and Dog Day Afternoon.
The plot of The Group is centred around a recovery group for various addicts, with the movie’s protagonist Kara ( Evangelina Burton) turning up to her first meeting in a while after disappearing for a sizeable period of time. While at first everything at the meeting appears to be typical, suddenly a mysterious lone gunman bursts into the room ( Dylan Baldwin) although initially he appears to be a random homicidally angry alopecia sufferer, as the narrative unwinds it’s revealed that he knows all of the attendees’ darkest secrets which he wants to make them pay for one by one.
The Group works as a movie for three key reasons : one is that the characters are well drawn and believable coming across as actual human beings rather than cardboard cut-outs from an after-school special ; second is that the atmosphere and tension is well set up from the get go with the narrative planting the seed of something being wrong early but skilfully never making it too obvious; and finally, the acting is genuinely excellent- with special praise being reserved by me for Evangelina Burton’s traumatised and downplayed performance as Kara and Dylan Baldwin’s portrayal of the lone gunman Jack, with Baldwin imbuing the character with a mixture of intense calm and magma- like rage at the same time.
Visually, The Group strongly reminds me of Darren Aronofsky’s and David Fincher’s early work crossed with a Massive Attack music video. It has a grimy and sepia tone quality to its visuals which complements the tone and subject matter of the movie to an absolute t. What I love about the cinematography of The Group the most however, is that Higo doesn’t go in for sloppy jump cuts or pound shop Paul Greengrass style shaky cam, instead favouring long takes with sparing cuts to really allow the audience to soak in the tension that he is trying to create.
Overall, The Group is an assured, expertly paced, well directed and acted movie from filmmaker Will Higo, who I think has a bright future ahead of him in the industry. At a sparse 1 hr 12 mins The Group is certainly worth your time if you’re in the market for a claustrophobic yet snappy thriller.
The Group is available now on VOD platforms.
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