Fest Track On Sirk TV Film Review: RIDDLE OF FIRE [Fantastic Fest 2023 - Austin, Texas]

The aspect of tone is always a tricky element to muster. With a film like "Riddle Of Fire", everything has to be firing on all cylinders. It is not an impeccably made movie but it has a magic and charm of its own that just rings true. Shot in Utah for Wyoming, it follows a band of three kids, misfits in their own way but on their own quest. Created in a way to reflect an almost Gaelic fantasy without anything really beyond the forests, streams and perspectives of witches, goblins and fairies spoken of, it creates a world all its own without CG and special effects. The performers and the filmmaking (down on 16mm) are the effects. Anchored by three kids (two boys and one girl) playing Alice, Hazel and Jodie, it is a perfect story of rebellion and of mercenaries and knights but from a almost child's perspective yet with a slightly adult twinge. It has the feeling of Jody Hill's early work. There is a bit of "Napolean Dynamite" especially with the dialogue but also a little seen film called "The Sasquatch Dumpling Gang" which had alot of the same humor. Here everyone is good but Skyler Peters as Jodie just steals the show because his dialogue is not quite decipherable, he has subtitles but his quips are dead on and garnered immense reaction from the audience. But he only works because the other two are there with him. There are darker themes running underneath the piece but director/writer Weston Razooli simply has created something all his own. People might make reference to "Stranger Things" as well as "Knights Of BadAssDom" but the feeling is on its separate wavelength. Everything has a reference and yet every detail is its own.

Perspective of how kids create a world even as bigger actions are happening around them are key. There is enough of a sense of danger, friendship, loyalty, magic and just great angles that don't have to be explained because the audience can pull their own experiences from it. Simply the element...putting it simply, of a quest for a certain egg drives everything. These kids aren't bad kids but they are not good kids. They are simply learning as they go along, making mistakes and growing, just like adults do. Everyone in this film is flawed, is there own person, but functions almost within a folktale world without saying so. Supermarkets become castles. Nightclubs become the pub that is snuck through. The forest is filled with magic. It is hard to describe how "Riddle" does it but it is effective. The music is a big part, especially a score, although there is a needledrop that works nicely later on. The timing of the kids (even though they are not the best actors overall) just begins to click as the film moves forward. The location adds so much too. At one point you see a map and it could have been Mordor because that is how they see their town and their world (though they never say it). The film is just subtle enough and obvious enough to really get what it is doing, making the quest, however it plays out, all the more fulfilling because everyone gets to fight another day. A-

By Tim Wassberg