“Refuge” is a frankly stupid and formulaic “whodunit” wrapped in torture, retribution and guilt from all the dirty secrets men keep.
Four friends since high school head off to a hunting/fishing cabin in the woods, rounded-up and driven there by Sam (Adam Sinclair).
We’ve heard Sam’s voice, frantically calling 911 years before when his 10 year old daughter was abducted. We saw him acquire a revolver. And you know what Chekhov said about guns in the first act.
Sam is certain one of his old chums was involved in his Sophie’s disappearance. And he’s got drugs to knock them out while drinking, duct tape to tie them down and an incriminating piece of evidence that somehow escaped the cops and which Sam apparently didn’t bring to their attention.
One of the men in this cabin knows more than he’s been willing to admit.
Could it be stoner, ex-con and perpetual screw-up Jay (Christopher Dietrick)? Could it be his short tempered teacher/older brother Mike (Adam Dorsey) ?
Or maybe the successful Barry (Donald Paul), the one with the sketchiest sexual past?
Through a long afternoon, evening and next day, Sam will drug and torture these three, rooting through their shared pasts, character traits, foibles and alibis to get to the truth.
“What IS this? Something out of a f—–g ‘Law & Order’ episode?”
No, the dialogue isn’t anything to quote or highlight on the resume of our Icelandic writer-director, Anton Sigurdsson. Not that his earlier credits — “Full Pockets,” “Graves & Bones” — are anything to brag about, either.
The acting isn’t good enough to steal attention from from the dialogue, broadly-drawn characters or the simpler-than-simplistic plot. Painting yourself into a corner with a four-character tale can be disastrous when you further reduce who might truly be to blame, and when you give your most thinly-developed character, Mr. “I have never felt more sane in my entire life” Sam, the torturer, to the least interesting actor in the lot.
There’s some novelty to the editing, little of it good.
The opening credits SLOWLY roll underneath an opening montage about the crime and the media aftermath of it. Right from the beginning, exposition and back-story are being presented with a screen covered with eight credited producers rolling past, distracting us from taking it all in.
Frankly, things don’t improve after that.
Rating: R, graphic violence, profanity, sexual subject matter
Cast: Christopher Dietrick, Adam Dorsey, Donald Paul and Adam Sinclair
Credits: Scripted ad directed by Anton Sigurdsson. A Saban Films release.
Running time: 1:26
