[Editor's Note: For more coverage of GIFF, check out Joe Bardi's cover story on GIFF and expanded Q&A with festival President Chad Moore Mitch Perry's story on festival entry Full Signal, and more reviews of some of the films playing the festival.]
Shot right next door in Lakeland, Endure is a great looking police procedural that struggles mightily to outshine similar cops-chasing-a-serial-killer movies now playing on basic cable. Judd Nelson (The Breakfast Club) stars as a detective on the trail a missing woman last seen (in a disturbing Polaroid picture) chained to a tree in the woods. Nelson is dealing with the twin problems of his wife's (Joey Lauren Adams) terminal illness and breaking in a new partner (Devon Sawa), a typical, well-educated hotshot who resents the treatment he gets from his more-experienced superior. Writer/Director Joe O'Brien has a terrific eye, capturing both atmospheric night scenes in the woods and warm moments in Nelson's house with equal facility. Yes, Endure suffers from problems with the plot, and scenes involving both Nelson and Sawa quickly become cliched and stilted, but there's still a lot to like here. Special shout-out to Clare Kramer, who does an incredible job playing the girl chained to a tree. The actress spends the entire movie with a gag in her mouth (she has no lines at all), yet manages to convey vast terror and physical exhaustion with only her eyes and some body language. It's a killer performance.
Endure is screening Sat. March 20 at 7:30 p.m. at the Muvico Centro Ybor.
Check out the trailer after the break …
This article appears in Mar 17-23, 2010.