Movie Review: Spoiler Alert

Tweet

RSSS

Tweet

Spoiler Alert (2009)

Boy, am I glad that I liked Spoiler Alert. Something tells me that the film’s director, David Rakowiecki, would have a few ideas for what to do with an online film writer who has he gall to write something negative about his debut feature.

Rakowiecki’s film tells the story of Brad Zuhl (Daniel Bartkewicz), online film critic and webmaster of the uber-influential TheGeek-Cave.com. On the night this geek opinion leader’s dream of becoming an actual filmmaker comes true, he gets an unexpected visitor to his basement apartment: Hollywood director Harrison Kane (Lars Stevens). Kane is a little sore about his Bones of the Dead being eviscerated on Zuhl’s site. So sore, in fact, that he’s come to kill the geek master.

Kane’s career tanked after that negative review turned his kung-fu fighting skeleton spectacular into a certified box office flop. Zuhl, a self-proclaimed cinematic purist, says there’s nothing person. As the story unfolds, we begin to see that Kane isn’t just some hack sellout and Zuhl’s opinions may not be based merely on his idealistic vision of the cinema.

Spoiler Alert isn’t a big movie. But it has some big ideas. At times it feels like Kane and Zuhl aren’t just two characters arguing over what makes a great movie. Instead they’re the manifestations of the internal debate any filmmaker has when trying to make art in the entertainment business.

Not unexpectedly, the tête-à-tête gets slow, but Rakowiecki is savvy enough to move the action forward before we get exhausted. Zuhl’s studio spy and screenwriting partner gets thrown into the mix. There’s a scene involving a staple gun. There’s backstabbing. There are twists and turns. And Kane’s back story gets interesting as the story progresses. For a film that takes place only inside one room, there’s a lot going on.

Would I have liked a better score? A better pace? Sure, but this above average indie with above average players is a lot of fun. Think Harry Knowles being held at gunpoint by Michael Bay fun. Any movie that can make that image pop into my head is worth watching. The fact that Rakowiecki has something to say is just the icing on the cake.