Fall (2022)
Directed by Scott Mann
For best friends Becky and Hunter, life is all about conquering fears and pushing limits. But after they climb 2,000 feet to the top of a remote, abandoned radio tower, they find themselves stranded with no way down. Now Becky and Hunter's expert climbing skills will be put to the ultimate test as they desperately fight to survive the elements, a lack of supplies, and vertigo-inducing heights.
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9 films that influenced Fall
What critics say influenced Fall
While this isn’t a horror movie in the traditional sense, there are enough gasp-inducing details, like close-ups of rusty screws loosening as Becky and Hunter climb the ladder rungs to the top, to remind one of watching a “Final Destination” movie where lingering danger is a ruthless predator.
In the lead up to Hunter and Becky’s long climb, director Scott Mann ratchets up the tension by channeling Final Destination in every loose screw and rickety ladder rung.
Mann’s depictions of events during the ladder-climb sequence echoes Final Destination in both foreshadowing and ominousness.
A funny word to use, considering how similar this film is to Neil Marshall’s The Descent , another absolutely horrifying film featuring the similar plotlines of a loss early in the film and the resulting grief being overcome by facing one’s fear.
The story itself is cobbled together from other sources–a touch of The Descent here, a whole scoop of The Shallows there, plenty of Open Water , lots of Frozen (no, not the “Let It Go” Frozen ).
The story itself is cobbled together from other sources–a touch of The Descent here, a whole scoop of The Shallows there, plenty of Open Water , lots of Frozen (no, not the “Let It Go” Frozen ).
Like other ‘stuck without hope’ films (Adam Green’s Frozen or Open Water come to mind) director Scott Mann pulls no punches here.
The best “trapped” films usually rely on realism, making viewers feel like they’re actually trapped in the rocky waves of a film like “Open Water,” and “Fall” crumbles under that analysis.
So, you have “1408”, “Buried”, “Locke”, “Trapped”, “The Shallows”, “Gerald’s Game”, “Frozen”, “Open Water”, “Phone Booth”, and “Oxygen“.
For fans of single-setting survival horror such as Adam Green’s Frozen , new thriller Fall delivers similar terrifying chills and nail-biting suspense.
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Inspired by movies such as Brad Bird’s Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (where the Burj Khalifa Tower in Dubai is scaled) and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi & Jimmy Chin’s Oscar®-winning documentary Free Solo , they went to work.
Fall opens ala Free Solo , with a trio of thrillseekers — Becky (Grace Caroline Currey, Shazam! ), her boyfriend Dan (Mason Gooding, 2022’s Scream ), and Hunter (Virginia Gardner, 2018’s Halloween ) — scaling a mountain of some kind.
They don’t have to be “good” in the narrative sense, but they should be thrilling as some of the best “escapist” movies revolve around bioengineered sharks (“Deep Blue Sea”), giant snakes (“Anaconda”) and crocodiles (“Lake Placid”).
They don’t have to be “good” in the narrative sense, but they should be thrilling as some of the best “escapist” movies revolve around bioengineered sharks (“Deep Blue Sea”), giant snakes (“Anaconda”) and crocodiles (“Lake Placid”).
The story itself is cobbled together from other sources–a touch of The Descent here, a whole scoop of The Shallows there, plenty of Open Water , lots of Frozen (no, not the “Let It Go” Frozen ).
So, you have “1408”, “Buried”, “Locke”, “Trapped”, “The Shallows”, “Gerald’s Game”, “Frozen”, “Open Water”, “Phone Booth”, and “Oxygen“.
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So, you have “1408”, “Buried”, “Locke”, “Trapped”, “The Shallows”, “Gerald’s Game”, “Frozen”, “Open Water”, “Phone Booth”, and “Oxygen“.