2:13Browsing through the bargain basement horror movie bin on Netflix/Amazon/Vudu (or whatever service we were using). Came across this and was intrigued. Lots of people in the cast whose faces you'd know including Ferris Buelher's dad, Sam from A Few Good Men, Wynn from Justified, Doyle from Slingblade, Rita's first husband on Dexter, the White Shadow, and Fokker's wife.
The movie was written by and starred a guy from Florence. Not Italy. Florence, Alabama. That was the first mistake. He wasn't good enough to carry the part. He was the Mark half of the old Mark and Brian radio show that some of you may remember. He should have stayed on the radio.
Second, he didn't have enough money to do it right. The sets were cheap, the sound editing was really bad. The FX was nearly non-existent. The transitions were bad and choppy. Even the clothes were second-rate. The lead guy recycled the same tie like eight times.
Third, he must have pictures of Ferris' dad, Sam, Wynn, Doyle, Rita's hubby, Shadow and Fokker's wife greasy and naked with goats or gnus. What these people were doing slumming in this movie is beyond me. It's not something I'd want on my resume.
As far as the story goes it had some potential. Or could have been in the right hands. Radio Mark mishandled pretty much every piece of what could have been an intriguing tale of childhood trauma and grown-up revenge. It was so poorly done it squeezed all the potential life out of the movie.
The biggest gaffe? Radio Mark was a rumpled, wrinkled, baggy-eyed mess that looked every bit of the 54 years he was at the time of filming (born in 1955) -- and then some. The trigger incident for the entire story supposedly happened when he was ten. The big bad of the film was -- according to the backstory -- about 25 at the time. Problem? The actor he hired for the big bad is nine years younger than he is and looks at least 20 years younger. So this 25 year old big bad only ages about 15 years over the FOURTY FOUR intervening years while Radio Mark ages a drooping 50 years? Absolutely terrible and destroyed whatever shreds of credibility the film might have had. Perhaps he forgot that on TV, people can SEE what you're doing.
Beyond that? It missed every possible emotional mark. Every reaction was forced and unrealistic. The actors (with the possible exception of Kevin Pollack) looked like they were fed their lines two minutes before reciting them and there were no retakes matter how stiff or dumb they sounded. A psychiatrists' trick was so ridiculously bad that they used it twice.
2:13 had the potential to be a solid psychological thriller, but was mishandled so badly by Radio Mark and a director whose primary credits are as producer on SI Swimsuit model home videos that the movie became a clunky, plodding mess. It needed a stronger lead, some better sets and a better team of writers to take the basic concept and polish it up.
Radio Mark should never be allowed to write and star in a movie again. I have no idea how he scraped up the cash to get this one done.
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