Title: Brute Sanity
Rating: NR
Director: Sam Vanivray
Starring: Adjovi Koene, Steven Lawlor-Nones, Sam Vanivray
Runtime: 1 hr 21mins

What It Is: An FBI agent retreats back to her neurological studies when a shocking murder takes her out of the body and out of mind. But the FBI and the bad guys aren’t done with her and her ability to see things for what they are and what they aren’t may help save the planet.

What We Think: I don’t get it. This film is done so well. A lot of effort when into the shots, both static and tracking. Other than the gunshots, a lot of effort clearly went into the props and special effects. Someone on this film must have gone to film school because the mise-en-scène is near perfection. But the dialogue, the acting, and narrative are so corny and it didn’t feel like that was intentional. With the corny dialogue and acting in mind, the film starts off with the main character infiltrating a cult to retrieve an artifact which isn’t too far off from some of the mainstream detective and cop shows on TV. When another agent gets shot the main character seems to withdraw from that career and get back into studying the human brain and how it processes certain things and the world around it. So maybe I’m watching a film rooted in life-changing medical discoveries? Nope. Because now there are aliens (or humanoid figures claiming to be).

So this film is a sci-fi and a big part of sci-fi is having to dumb down the film’s on-screen universe so the content can be understood by sci-fi buffs who speak colloquial Klingon and someone who saw the title of the film and went “hmm that sounds interesting”. That mark is missed by a longshot with this film. There are a lot of ideas and after sitting and thinking for a bit there are a lot of great ideas and concepts in this film — but the flow of it, the dialogue, the acting, some illogical sequences and actions, and characters being introduced music video style — ruin it.

Our Grade: D, This breaks my heart because the cinematography, art direction, and production value — minus the gunshots which were really really bad — were so good. But it could not mask what felt like a directionless film. A concept not completely fleshed out. An unfinished sentence. I finished this film with a big question mark on my face.