Surveillance

One of the great things about having an HD cable subscriptions is that there are some really cool channels that are not available in other subscription packages. One of those channels is HDNet. HDnet is pretty much why HD was invented, there are lots of documenteries about far off places, HD concerts, and HD movies.

HDNet does something that no other channel does, which is play one interesting indie movie every month that has not yet come out in theaters. I find that incredible, but when you have spent a lot of money on an HD TV there had better be a reason to own it other than "it looks pretty". Which brings me to the movie I watched Wednesday night; Surveillance.

Surveillance has been heavily promoted on HDNet the past month and I was really excited to see it. It has everything you could want in a movie. Violence. Check. A murder mystery. Check. Bill Pullman. Double check. It was even written and directed by Jessica Lynch and produced by her father David Lynch. That should have been my first warning about this movie.

Surveillance begins with two masked intruders, breaking into the home of a good looking middle age couple in the middle of the night. The intruders then begin to brutally beat the husband with a machete while the wife watches in horror. She manages to escape only to be run down by the killer's white van. That's pretty much where the movie stops being interesting.

In the next scene we are introduced to the FBI agents (Bill Pullman and Julia Ormon) who are being sent to investigate the carnage that happened at the home as well as another incident. Immediately the movie dives into the typical cliches including and not limited to: cops who don't like FBI, dumb redneck cops, dumb yet sexy drug addicts, a kid that tries to warn everyone but no one listen to, and a twist in the plot that any one who has ever watched a movie can spot a mile away. I don't want to give too much away but I was left feeling very underwhelmed.

I truly went into Surveillance thinking I was going to be wowed but I just left feeling a little bit pissed off because the movie made me feel like I was dumb and would find brilliance in its mediocrity, but what do you expect from David Lynch's daughter?

I give Surveillance 2 machete chops to the neck out of five.