Movie Review: BLACKOUT

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: April 12th, 2024 / 01:03 AM

BLACKOUT movie poster | ©2024 Dark Sky Films/Glass Eye Pix

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Alex Hurt, Addison Timlin, Motell Gyn Foster, Joseph Castillo-Midyett, Ella Rae Peck, Rigo Garay, John Speredakos, Michael Buscemi, Jeremy Holm, Cody Kostro, Marc Senter, Kevin Corrigan, Joe Swanberg, Asta Paredes, Clay von Carlowitz, Barbara Crampton, James Le Gros, Marshall Bell
Writer: Larry Fessenden
Director: Larry Fessenden
Distributor: Dark Sky Films/Glass Eye Pix
Release Date: March 13, 2024 (New York); April 12, 2024 (VOD, digital)

What would you do if you suspected you had become a werewolf? That is the propelling question of BLACKOUT, an intelligent horror film with a fair amount of character development and plot complexities.

After an opening sequence in which a full moon hangs over a double killing, we meet Charley Barrett (Alex Hurt). A graphic artist, Charley is clearing all of his artwork out of the motel room where he’s been holed up for the past month.

Some of Charley’s drawings and paintings are pastoral, lovely portraits of the woods. Others are more disturbing self-portraits, showing everything from a lost-looking Charley to the face of a monster.

Charley correctly believes he is a werewolf. He knows when it happened, but can’t remember how or why. He also doesn’t remember what he does on those nights – the full moon, the night before and the night after – as he experiences blackouts. However, Charley and the whole town of Talbot Falls know about the gory murders that have been occurring on those nights for the past few months.

Charley is determined to tie up loose ends before enlisting a friend to help him end it all. One of those loose ends concerns the actions of his late father on behalf of developer Sam Hammond (Marshall Bell), the richest man around.

Hammond, meanwhile, is trying to blame the killings on Miguel Lopez (Rigo Garay), a construction worker who speaks up for the mostly Latino team building Hammond’s resort property. Hammond doesn’t like “those people” being in “his” town.

Hammond also happens to be Charley’s father-in-law, although Charley has removed himself from beloved wife Sharon (Addison Timlin).

All of this adds up to developments that make total sense, yet are expected by absolutely no one involved.

The notion of a sympathetic character in the normal world dealing with the reality of being a werewolf has prominently been dealt with in AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON (there are others, but that’s still the go-to example). BLACKOUT has a more serious tone without going for melodrama.

Director/writer Larry Fessenden has a wonderfully down-to-Earth style that makes much of BLACKOUT feel like a slightly melancholy, slightly bemused character study. Charley’s artwork provides a nice note of surrealism, and the various forms of collateral damage keep us guessing as to what may occur next.

Fassenden also gets good mileage with his subplots about exploitation of labor and of the environment. We’re invested in these, partly because they’re so important to Charley.

Hurt gives a soulful, nuanced performance as Charley. (For film buffs, yes, that’s Hurt’s real-life father William Hurt as Charley’s dad in the family photos.) Bell has the right sort of lifelong crustiness as Hammond and Timlin projects tenderness and vulnerability as Sharon. Joseph Castillo-Midyett and Ella Rae Peck are both sturdy as the town’s long-suffering law enforcement. John Speredakos has conviction as the local pastor, and Motel Gyn Foster is lively as Charley’s eccentric artist/musician buddy.

A couple minor gripes: Charley’s inability to recall what happened on the night he was turned is so built up that the revelation doesn’t fully land. Also, the werewolf makeup is a bit, well, cute. It arguably would have been more effective had it more closely resembled some of the paintings we see throughout.

Mostly, though, BLACKOUT is insightful, reflective, and achieves genuine emotional weight by its conclusion.

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