Checked out the generically-titled Don’t Let Go… a movie that might have once been called Relive. It’s a twisty timey winey sci-fi murder mystery so I guess the marketing department thought the title Don’t Let Go would bring in the mass audiences? Doubt it… not sure much would save this movie since that same marketing department didn’t put any effort into the movie yet they also released it over Labor Day weekend. Confusing.
Regardless of the behind-the-scenes stuff, Don’t Let Go is an interesting but flawed movie. It’s about a police detective who has a contentious relationship with his brother and sister-in-law but is great friends with their daughter. But one night, he gets a call and finds that all three of them have been murdered. And then he gets a phone call from the girl… a phone call from two weeks in the past before the murder. Now he has to to work with her in the past to solve the crime and hopefully change time.
It’s a pretty good idea and has some satisfyingly twisty temporal plot points. The acting is very good. The cop is played by David Oyelowo and the niece is Storm Reid, last scene in the Wrinkle in Time movie. They do a very good job, especially with the heavy emotional scenes which the movie does allow them (it’s not all just time loop and detective stuff).
Sadly, the interesting idea and cool time twist stuff can’t save the movie. It winds up plodding and a little too confusing as the story progresses. It can’t hold up its premise, possibly because they are on a very low budget and have no unique ways to present their high concept. It devolves too much to a series of conversations with our main characters in different scenes.
But, hey, it’s a pretty good attempt that it isn’t an absolute failure. It starts strong and ends pretty well… they just couldn’t sustain the pace through the length of a full-length motion picture. It’d have been better as a short film.
Score: 72