The Occupant

This film had a decent foundation as well as its concept, but The Occupant falls for the oldest trick in the book when it comes to a science fiction film and that's when they relegate it for filler near the end. Instead its a survival story with a character facing a predicament both physically and figuratively.

Survival stories are usually exciting because you watch a character struggle and dig down deep to survive precarious oppositions and get back to civilization in one piece.

Our lead actress Ella Balinska does try her hardest but her character isn't very interesting on the page, other than the usual guilt riding characteristic. It is also quite slow paced and for a film clocking in at about 100 minutes, it means it could easily have been trimmed in the editing department.

It is however a beautifully shot film from Dutch director Hugo Keijzer, The musical score from Renger Koning is pretty solid as it adds to the film's overall vibe. When you finally get to the pinch of sci-fi this movie holds in the third act, it is enjoyable but too little too late.

Was really hoping for a much better and stronger film, but sometimes you get shortcomings.

Abby (Ella Balinska) is a British Geologist who has been working around the world for months in a row. She desperately needs the money to pay for her dying sister's (Vanessa Ifediora) medical treatment. But now, when she's finally on her way home, her helicopter crashes, killing the pilot. Abby finds herself stranded and alone in an icy wilderness, where a mysterious helper may or may not be her salvation.

This starts off a little like "Long Distance" where 2 astronauts crash land on an alien planet are trying to meet each other using just radio chatter.

It's also reminiscent of "Keep Breathing" where a woman has to survive after a plane crash in a mountain region.

However it is nowhere near as good as either film. Balinska puts in a fine performance in terms of acting. But the film has no point and no flow and the story is mired in obscure dreams and flashbacks. I did try hard to follow it but I stopped short of googling to make sense of it. If a film can't tell you a story in the screenplay, it's not a very good film anyway.

I rated it a 4 and that was solely for Balinskas acting.

Where to start?

Was looking forward to this.

Sci-fi vs reality.

Human difficulty vs death

No spoilers, this is a movie of three parts and they just fail to join up.

Lots of open ends, with no answers.

Full of promise and yet delivers less and less as time goes on.

I was hoping the end would be transindetal or sci-fi laden, no such luck.

Starts bleak and this theme continues all the way through. Depressing with a weak storyline. At times events seem random and irrelevant. Theres a random character thrown in half way through for some reason. Such a slow film. Very whimsical with a very anticlimactic ending. Save yourself the bother and don't bother.

This is a weird movie. It felt to me like it was more of a vanity project than a movie made to entertain or make a profit. Its full of long picturesque shots of great scenery, snow, forest, and rock formations, but without much substance or any real depth. The misleading title bares little relevance to whats on offer, and the story is an odd combination of two notions that meld rather poorly.

It's a story essentially of loss, dealing with it and the pain of losing close emotional attachement. Unfortunately, the movie does this by meandering along a path that gets boring quickly and deludes into thinking theres going to be some sort of payoff somewhere, but sadly there isn't any.

The majority if of the movie is spent following our stunningly beautiful lead Ella Balinska as she treks across the wilderness. Very little happens, there's very little development save the flashbacks to her homelife and the short insights were given to her character.

To be fair it's not a terrible movie if you have almost two hours to spare. You could do worse, but its certainly not a good movie, less so an entertaining one. The begining suggests that there was a sci-fi themed thread at play, but this never really pans out. Even though the prelude did seem initially interesting, I was bored twenty minutes in, and this didn't really improve throughout the one hour and forty minute produciton.

There's only a handful of roles on offer here, and essentially the whole movie rests on the shoulders of one actor, Balinska, who to to be fair, gives a pretty solid performance, but it just isn't enough. The tale is a threadbare offering too long, and too abstract.

There is nothing of interest, no payoff and its not even an interesting watch.

In all honesty my advise is to give this one a miss. I don't like to be overly critical with my reviews but there just isn't anything on offer here.

3/10 is all I can manage.