Help – Keeps You On Your Toes
Director: Blake Ridder
Writer: Blake Ridder (Screenplay)
Starring: Emily Redpath, Sarah Alexandra Marks, Louis James, Blake Ridder, Duncan James, Stuart Wolfe-Murray, Amy Jim
Plot: A young woman’s life turns chaotic when she uncovers a deadly secret about her friend.
Tagline – Everyone has a secret
Runtime: 1 Hour 36 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Story: Help starts when Grace (Redpath) goes through a break up with her long-distance boyfriend, looking to visit her best friend Liv (Marks) and her partner Edward (James).
The trip will take Grace to the country home of the couple, were it doesn’t take long before secrets from the past start to crop up, putting a bigger strain on the already edgy relationship.
Thoughts on Help
Characters & Performances – Grace is the best friend coming to visit her friend in the country, she has been through a break-up with this being her chance to escape for a while. She does have an attraction to her best friend’s partner, which will make for some awkward sequences, as she knows something isn’t right between the couple. Liv is the best friend who finds herself in a happy relationship living a life of luxury away from the world. Edward is the partner who seems to be one that brings in most of the money, but has a dirty mind, he does have a connection to Grace from their careers too. We only really get to meet these three, with them coming together for the time in the country home, which will see the secrets coming out, but we don’t seem to get as much of a connection to any of them in the way we could have. The performances are solid for what we are seeing, but with a bit more, certain moments would have made a bigger impact.
Story – Help brings us a story that will see three people come together in a country home with their own secrets in the world, ones they keep from each other that will become clear as more time is spent together, proving you can’t always judge a book by its cover. The story will look to bring plenty of twists along the way, which will become surprising, rather than just thrown in, with the intention of trying to bring about a more important message about people. How everything plays out, is done in a slower pace, trying to keep back the big reveal for the last act, only throwing a lot of information out at once, instead of a slow set of reveals through the film.
Themes – Help is a mystery thriller that will leave us asking plenty of questions about what is happening within the walls of the country home, which will help created the isolated location away from the world, where you can never tell what is going on within the walls of a home.
Final Thoughts – Help is a mystery with plenty to offer in the surprise side of the story.