Joel Edgerton in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
Opening in broad launch in theaters on January 2 is ‘The Plague,’ written and directed by Charlie Polinger and starring Joel Edgerton, Everett Blunck, Kayo Martin, Kenny Rasmussen, Lennox Espy, and Lucas Adler.
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Preliminary Ideas
(L to R) Everett Blunck and Joel Edgerton in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
Arriving actually on the tail finish of 2025 (and increasing proper after the New 12 months), ‘The Plague’ is among the 12 months’s most unique and totally unsettling films.
It’s not horror, not precisely, however it has a thick environment of dread and disquiet to rival extra standard style choices. In reality, ‘The Plague’ is nearly indescribable, however calling it a mixture of psychological thriller and twisted coming-of-age drama wouldn’t be far off the mark – and it’s an unnervingly successful mixture within the fingers of Charlie Polinger, making his function writing and directing debut, and an impressive solid of boys.
Story and Path
Joel Edgerton in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
It’s the summer season of 2003 and socially awkward, 12-year-old Ben (Everett Blunck) arrives on the Tom Lerman Water Polo Membership for camp, the sufferer of – we discover out slightly later – a foul divorce and parental neglect. Determined to slot in with the pack of ‘cool’ boys led by the sneering, mean-spirited Jake (Kayo Martin), Everett learns a couple of ‘recreation’ referred to as ‘The Plague,’ during which an outcast child named Eli (Kenny Rasmussen) is the item of derision due to an inexplicable explosion of an acne-like rash throughout his face, arms, and again.
Should you go close to Eli, work together with him, or particularly contact him, you could possibly catch the ‘Plague’ your self, and whereas nobody actually believes that is the case, it makes the misfit, oddball child the right scapegoat and goal that each one clusters of younger boys appear to want. However when the decent-minded, harmless Ben tries to construct a friendship with Eli, the torments escalate and threaten to embody him as properly.
What feels like a grimmer than typical coming-of-age story about pre-teen males and their rites of passage takes on a fair darker shade, due to the meanness and feral depth of the boys, the character of Eli’s affliction (which isn’t defined), and the imagery that Polinger and DP Steven Breckon deliver to the fore.
(L to R) Kayo Martin, Caden Burris, and Lennox Espy in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
The camp itself is generally indoors, making it appear extra like a lab than a camp, and the nighttime scenes flip it right into a haunted home of darkish, winding corridors. The pool scenes have a shimmery solid to them, flashes of purple from above symbolizing the metaphorical blood within the water. Polinger and Breckon shoot the water polo scenes from under, highlighting the violent thrashing of the boys’ our bodies.
And let’s not overlook the burrowing-under-the-skin sound design by Damian Volpe and the ghostly mixture of percussion and tribal voices that make up Johan Lenox’s rating, one of the vital putting of the 12 months. All of it coheres into an immersive but oppressive expertise, emphasizing the central battle – which begins proper right here in childhood – between wanting to adapt and needing to specific one’s true self, the latter of which might carry grave penalties.
Solid and Performances
Kenny Rasmussen in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
Joel Edgerton (who helped Polinger get the movie on the launchpad and is listed as a producer) is the nominal star right here because the coach, Daddy Wags, and he brings the right steadiness of gruff taskmaster and massive brother to a person who’s clearly not particularly vibrant and in over his head (no pun meant) with this bunch of youngsters. However as robust of an anchor as Edgerton is, the actual stars listed here are the trio of younger leads.
Everett Blunck is each delicate and enigmatic as Ben, his real empathy and decency in direct battle together with his damaged coronary heart and his must belong. Because the vicious Jake, alpha chief of the pack, Kayo Martin has a face on which cruelty and good humor can nearly go for one another – he’s at all times calculating the right way to wring probably the most ache out of any state of affairs for his goal.
After which there’s Kenny Rasmussen. In his display screen debut, Rasmussen retains the viewer off-balance all through – one by no means is aware of if Eli is having a joke at everybody’s expense or prone to slaughter his campmates with out hesitation (he’s additionally obtained that Stanley Kubrick stare – made well-known by Jack Nicholson in ‘The Shining’ and Vincent D’Onofrio in ‘Full Metallic Jacket’ – down chilly). His barely decrease voice provides an eerie impact to his efficiency as properly, which is just gorgeous.
Last Ideas
(L to R) Everett Blunck, Kayo Martin, Caden Burris, and Lennox Espy in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
‘The Plague’ is the type of movie that ought to – and hopefully will – not simply catch on with audiences however spark dialogue and debate over its which means and themes. Its gang of stressed, awkward, sexy malcontents on the sting of adolescence, with all their cruelty, vindictiveness, and surly disgrace, might be a metaphor for the poisonous masculinity making a comeback in society like a band nobody wished to see reunite.
Or they might simply be a pack of little boys who don’t know the right way to deal with the unusual issues bursting from their our bodies and are unable to be comfortable with their actual selves. Both means, ‘The Plague,’ its surreal imagery and sound, its discomforting performances, and its nerve-rending rating will depart you questioning precisely what sort of little monsters we’re elevating.
‘The Plague’ receives a rating of 90 out of 100.
Everett Blunck in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.
What’s the plot of ‘The Plague’?
A socially anxious 12-year-old boy is pulled right into a merciless custom at an all-boys’ water polo camp, with harrowing penalties for him and the item of the opposite boys’ derision as the road between the sport and actuality blur.
Who’s within the solid of ‘The Plague’?
- Joel Edgerton as Daddy Wags
- Everett Blunck as Ben
- Kayo Martin as Jake
- Kenny Rasmussen as Eli
- Lennox Espy as Julian
- Lucas Adler as Logan
- Elliott Heffernan as Tic Tac
- Caden Burris as Matt
- Kolton Lee as Corbin
Everett Blunck in Charlie Polinger’s ‘The Plague’. Courtesy of Steven Breckon. An Unbiased Movie Firm launch.