VOD Review: Radius (2017)

"As haunting as it is gripping."

High-concept movies that offer a truly unique premise are a rare thing indeed. Titles like Memento, Fight Club, or even Edge of Tomorrow come to mind as examples of movies that offer plot lines that both thrill and bend the normal lines of linear storytelling.

Radius is a movie like that. It's a small movie in scope, but its got a superb hook that can't be ignored, and its a rare film that takes its time with its reveals, and even when it feeds us some info to digest, we're left not truly knowing everything that happened.

And we didn't mind one bit.

A man wakes up on the side of the road after a horrible car accident to find that he doesn't remember who he is, or what happened. As he stumbles for help, all he finds are dead people and animals, which makes him fear that he's stuck in the middle of an airborne viral outbreak.

OH, IT'S NOT AIRBORNE.

To make matters worse, he discovers through trial and error that any living being that comes within 50 feet (maybe 30?) of him drops dead, so it's him causing the mass death all around him. He tries to seclude himself at his home so as not to kill anyone else, but the arrival of a pretty girl changes everything, when she appears to be immune to the effects of his death radius. As a bonus, as long as she stays by him, no one else dies either. Separate them though, and it's not good for anyone nearby.

WHAT A WAY TO GO...

Are the two of them connected somehow? And if so, what happened, and is there any cure for him other than to keep her close? The two of them (who eventually discover their names), will search for the answers together, although what they find might just make matters worse.

DUDE, STOP KILLING PEOPLE.

The idea of anyone coming within a 50 foot radius of you instantly dropping dead is a terrifying one, and it makes for one hell of an intriguing movie premise. Thankfully, Radius makes the most out of that unique premise, with things playing out like an old episode of The Twilight Zone.

The way that the story unfolds in this one is what truly makes it special. We know that something happened to Liam and Jane, but we never quite find out exactly what it was; "A cosmic event" in the form of lightning strike is as deep as the details go on that front. That's alright though, because as much as we wanted to a know what happened and why, it was really the journey of the two main characters that kept us at 100% attention.

As we are fed bits and pieces of Liam and Jane's memories that help us as an audience to figure out what in the hell happened to them, those memories paint a bigger picture that culminates in a reveal that was truly shocking. And pretty awesome, in our opinion. And that big reveal served to humanize the movie even more; we will not spoil it, so it's going to be hard to articulate just how it changed things, but it made the ending a bit more tragic in a way.

And that ending... well, it had an impact to say the least.

ALL THIS POOR BASTARD WANTED TO DO WAS EAT SOME GRASS.

Lots of people and animals dropping dead in this one, and there's a bit of gun violence, but it's fairly light on the blood flow front.

HE'S HAVING A ROUGH DAY.

Not that kind of movie at all.

IT MAKES US MAD TOO, CHARLOTTE.

Every now and then a smaller movie like Radius comes along and knocks our socks off. It's not a perfect film, but it's about as engaging and gripping as any movie we've seen this year. The bottom line is that if you like Sci-fi Thrillers, and if you're a sucker for a unique hook, then this is one movie that you really should check out.

Avoid spoilers, and enjoy.

A

Radius is available now on DVD and VOD.

We like blonde Charlotte Sullivan the best, but she's beautiful no matter what color hair she's rocking.