Back in 2017, resident Surgeon Antony Yee cast his thoughts on the Benson and Moorhead co directed feature, The Endless, and for the sake of not wanting to repeat his wise words too much, but after watching their latest outing Synchronic starring Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan, I’m left puzzled about the horror genre attachment to their movies.
Whilst Benson and Moorhead are a craft of their own, which is to be highly applauded in the way they carve unique and compelling storyline into their features, the signature genre should be more attached to Sci-Fi drama. The horror element is but a minor component to the grand scale vision that these masters of storytelling guide their audience through.
Anthony Mackie seriously owns this movie, no disrespect to his co-star, Dornan who does a decent job as Dennis, a married man with children. Dorman’s character is to be the solid, dependable one of the partnership, which is needed for Mackie’s Steve, a guy who can be described as a player. He knows his flaws and owns them, but interestingly has morals, despite his car wreck of a persona.
Both Steve and Dennis are paramedics who stumble across a curious phenomenon among some of the victims or patients they encounter during their late shifts.
There are two key points that occur to the leads that fundamentally change them. For Dennis, it’s the sudden disappearance of his troubled daughter, Brianna. For Steve, it’s when he’s diagnosed with a brain tumour.
This latter discovery propels Steve on a mission to search further into this curious drug called Synchronic that seems to connect the strange behaviour in the patients and Brianna’s disappearance.
Unsurprisingly, a common theme in the Directors’ work is at play here; one of time travel and manipulation. It’s Steve’s journey that casts him deeper into mind-bending reality by experimenting with the Synchronic drug in the hopes that if he were to succeed, he could prove his character once again.
The Prognosis:
This is no horror show, but a wonderfully creative and superbly shot journey that casts the audience into the core of humanity through time.
It infuses a Bringing Out The Dead with a Cronenberg-style psyche and injected with a visual treat from Directors Benson and Moorhead that confirms that they are leading storytellers in the film medium.
- Saul Muerte