Knife Point (2009) User Reviews

A Nice Antidote To The Christian Films Coming Out This Year

[Theo Robertson · 8/10 · 23 March 2014]

2014 is the year of the Christian movie . So far we've seen SON OF GOD and GOD'S NOT DEAD do relatively well at the box office while next month sees NOAH released which I'm certainly looking forward to if only to see another film by Darren Aronofsky the most interesting and talented director of recent years and we'll also be getting EXODUS by Ridley Scott later in the year . It seems God has the Midas touch these days but that's probably why he was invented and it's nice to see a film come along where Christians aren't shown as sappy happy clappy naive bible kissers . KNIFE POINT from 2009 is that movie

I enjoyed this short but this wasn't just down to any sort of message or agenda it's giving out but simply because Carlo Mirabella Davis has made a short film done in the spirit and ethos of indie film making and perhaps on a meta-physical the principles America was built upon . It has a rather slow pace but this is in no way a criticism and considering I watched THE MUMMY:TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR I know what approach I prefer . The slow pace allows the audience to speculate as to how the story might progress . It starts off with Gerry , a knife salesman packing his wares and instantly you're thinking that knives like guns are weapons and perhaps this might tie in with the story . Throughout the narrative there's a slight feel of portent dread about to happen and manifest itself which it does at the climax . Until we get there we have a slow burning understated drama of a man on a journey with some strangers whose silence is disconcerting and is in keeping with the feel of the film . It might be slow , it might be obvious , but I was reminded of " Beware of those who believe in God for they are capable of anything " . Let's also not forget that anyone who refers to Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin as being " Christians " when in fact they were deists is not to be trusted

Effective atmosphere and tone but a shame it is rather obvious and slow in content

[bob the moo · 17 March 2014]

A knife salesman is on down on his luck and is trying to get by without a car when he gets reached out to by a family of evangelistic Christians who happen to be travelling the same way and offer him a lift. As the odd group travel across the state they stop at some typically red-state places (the diner, the roller-rink) and the topics of Jesus and America start coming up – topics that salesman Gerry has long since stopping thinking about.

This film does atmosphere really well. It has a constant unnerving stillness to it and the deliberate cinematography makes it look really good in a passive but suggestive way. The focus on small detail helps this but I also liked that even noisy diners and roller-skating rinks were presented in a dead, rather creepy way just with the sound and the look of the scenes. It continues this deliberate tone all the way to the end and it is this that I enjoyed it for. It is a real shame then that it doesn't have much around this to help. The plot is a lot more obvious than I would have liked and the use of "red state Christians" is overdone and limits the film in how simply it uses them as caricatures. The rather obvious direction of the plot also means that we don't get much of a payoff in return for the slow burn pace – it has merit in the ending but not too much.

The performances are mostly good. Gorn is a solid lead while Sheil is very good in her role, a lot of stillness and pain in there and, although hard to describe, she sold her character. The others have simpler characters and deliver them straight for what they are, which is a shame but not their fault. The film does the atmosphere well and those that enjoy their films to have a creepy slow burning style will enjoy this one, but it is a shame that it treads such a familiar path while it does it.