FilmSnobReviews

Title: The Xrossing
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Director: Steven J. Mihaljevich
Starring: Luke J. Morgan, Kelton Pell, Jacob O’Neill
Runtime: 1 hr 48 mins

What It Is: A young woman’s murdered body is recovered in Australia. Following her death, events lead three teen boys to suspect an old and mysterious indigenous man who lives nearby. When they attempt to investigate the old man’s house while he’s out, one of the boys accidentally leaves his wallet behind only to find the old man has nothing else to give than wisdom and kindness, leaving the boy to contemplate his place in his community as well as understanding things aren’t always as they seem.

What We Think: When it comes to these mid-stinkers, I find myself apologetic. I always want to preface the review by writing “hey, sorry, but this is gonna sound rude…” No. Not my job to say sorry, because it is what it is. That’s being a reviewer and I always encourage filmmakers to compartmentalize and ignore the reviews they don’t like.

That being said, there’s nothing really beyond this movie other than its synopsis. It actually looks quite pretty, so hats off to the cinematographer, but right off the bat you can tell from the cheesy, Lifetime-channel-esque dramatic score that it’s not going to be such a fun ride. The story is simple yet delivered without much focus, well-intentioned but plainly so, as is most other “humanizing the other” type films that try to put a straight white guy in the position of realizing that the lonely, mysterious, weird, or minority old guy/woman is not actually as bad as they seem. You’ve seen it, we’ve all seen it–the tragedy lies within the attempt itself. The acting overall was off as if the cast was lacking chemistry with each other, though it was all likely to blame for a flat and narrow, copy/paste script. Overall, the film centers around two “deep” themes: fear of the other, and coming-of-age.

Our Grade: D+, Harmless and meandering in spite of its emotional intent, I couldn’t recommend this film for the life of me. It rings very much like a film that would be conceptualized by someone I would know in college, storylines and characters we’ve seen and heard before watered down to try and make the point that white people should not be mean to people of color and old people. Which is fine, but my lovely snobs, I would much rather you watch many other films to have the same lesson hammered into your heads that would bring you much more of an experience than anything else.