I often opine about modern action movies which (I feel) often exploit their characters in favor of bone breaking fight choreography and unrealistic violence.  Well, here is one with solid reasoning for its action, which is presented in realistic fashion.  Sure, it’s a whopper of a story, but the film follows through on its premise and delivers a bruising, surprising, harrowing experience.

Anna Foerster’s movie centers on Lou (Allison Janney), a burned-out woman in Washington state, called into action when her young renter, Hannah (Jurnee Smollett), reports that her daughter Vee (Ridley Asha Bateman), has been kidnapped just as a big storm rolls in.  The two women trample off into the woods to try to find the girl, even as they work out their contentious relationship and dramatic secrets are revealed.

Allison Janney is surprisingly believable as a woman of action when Lou needs to be, and the film’s secrets are more dramatic than I expected — I feel now that I should have seen them coming, but I did not.  She also has a great dog, Jax.  Hannah is a more troubling character; she is more clueless than even I was.  The film’s greatest asset is its location filming in the forests of Washington (Canada), which provides stunning authenticity to their trek.  My only quibble is that the big storm isn’t particularly big or long lasting; still, the actors must have been genuinely uncomfortable cavorting around in the wet woods.

Ultimately I appreciated what the film has to say about familial relationships and the burden they bring (the kidnapper is the girl’s father, previously thought to be dead).  This isn’t great art but it is an exciting, provocative film about survival and sacrifice to save what really matters.  ☆ ☆ ☆.  26 September 2022.