IR Film Review: INFINITE STORM [Bleeker Street]
Naomi Watts doesn't take the easy roles. During the pandemic she did both this film and "The Desperate Hour" (which we recently talked to her for). While the latter film seemed to be a challenging approach, "Infinite Storm" by comparison seems alot more grueling as well as more taxing physically and emotionally. Co-Financed by the Polish Film Institute and filmed in Slovenia (which one hears is a beautiful country), the movie is based on a true story in New Hampshire about a search and rescue lady named Pam Bales who saved a young man during a particularly bad storm. Now while the progression of the movie is tension-filled and Watts puts her all into it, much of the time it feels like there are holes in motivation. Granted as the movie goes on, one gets the sense of why she feels and acts this way without going into too many details except the true cause. The reason to go up the mountain repeatedly might have to do with a sense of both distance and existence. People do certain things to feel connected though the reasoning of being there in the first place is a little vague but such is human psychology sometimes.
The same with John (played by Billy Howle). The understanding is there but the aspect of being able to be so far up where he was found, even on a good day, strains credibility. As a result despite some heart-wrenching scenes, especially when Watts returns home, there is a lack of full blown empathy for the connection between them. Watts as Barnes is luminous and this is one of her better performances (and she has done some good ones) but the movie as a whole is barely solid enough to handle it. The grueling cinematography both dense and foreboding plays in a certain "127 Hours" style but with a ticking clock approach. What can be misleading is the structure which points the audience in a certain direction but also circumspects it. There is a shift and yet there is a psychological impediment that makes one think that human nature would have placed a more resentful or piercing reasoning in one of the characters. Granted the film plays in an altruistic sense about survival without answering the question of why. But that is also one of the metaphors in the texture that each person must figure that out for themselves. B-
By Tim Wassberg
