Rage (2021) (VOD) – Movie Review
Follow Genre: Thriller, Drama
Director: John Balazs
Distributor: Prima Lux Films
Duration: 143 minutes

Rage (2021) (VOD) – Movie Review

Site Score
6.2
Good: Good tension build-up early on
Bad: The story feels like it got nothing to add in general, and the movie gets dragged out
User Score
6.6
(9 votes)
Click to vote
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Rating: 6.6/10 (9 votes cast)

With the following review of the movie Rage, it is not to be confused with earlier movies sharing the same name, such as the movie starring Nicolas Cage. It’s a title that hints at our primal emotions, where you would expect a film starring The Punisher just going at it, murdering everybody, or somebody conflicted with this bubbling mix of angry feelings not knowing what to do with them. This movie named Rage is not really either of those things, which we’ll delve right into.

In Rage we get to know typical husband Noah (Matt Theo) and wife Madeline (Hayley Beveridge), who are going through a rough patch in their marriage. It’s a recognizable portrait for anybody who ever went through a rough time in their relationship. Small meaningless annoyances, recognizing something is wrong with your partner but being unable to get them to talk, and mainly simply not getting what you want, is what is going on between the two. A brutal home invasion changes this, as both barely get out with their lives. After this introduction, the movie adds detective John Bennett (Richard Norton) as one of the main characters. He is tasked with figuring out who the hell turned the lives of Noah and Maddy upside-down, and what caused this event in the first place.

The flow of the story is a bit disappointing. The build-up is pretty alright with half an hour of introductory story and tension slowly building up, but almost all the information you need for the rest of the movie is also given in that first half-hour. Other than that, some minor details and progression is given later on, but most of the time there’s literally no progression for the story in general, as well as detective Bennett’s progress in the case given. This breaks most of the tension and makes the story feel like a dragged-out attempt to show “what happens to people after trauma”. If anything, it’s partially like looking at a real-life documentary, at times with decent acting. Sadly, when viewing a movie, especially thrillers, you kind-of want to skip the boring parts you come across in real life. There are a couple of interesting twists throughout the movie, though none of them feel like they make Rage special enough to stand out. Sadly, the trope of “exploring trauma”, and according to the title, “rage”, has been done better quite a few times in other movies.

The characters in Rage also feel stereotyped if anything. Noah is your typical “this is what happens if you don’t communicate with your lover” embodiment. John Bennett is the typical “rather tough detective who secretly smokes”. There’s your nasty cop, sleazy private detective, and so on. If anything, Maddie (Madeline) is the most interesting character because she has to do a lot of acting where the rule “show don’t tell” applies. Traumatized by past happenings, she often remains silent during the course of the movie. As soon as she starts talking again, she sadly becomes less believable as well. It’s not even that the entire cast is made up out of bad actors, but it’s more their characters who are often poorly written. Their background stories are just poked at without going in any deeper, and they react to situations in ways a writer would assume somebody reacts based on stereotypes without having much first-hand experience. Characters their general motivation just generally doesn’t come across well by all the previously named causes, making it hard to feel for those portrayed.

We viewed the digital version, so we don’t know if there will be any special features in a possible physical release. That being said, this is not a movie that would require those extra features as there is simply not much to explore. Perhaps some depth about the psychology of trauma and cast interviews could add something the movie fails to offer, but that’s about it.

Conclusion

Rage feels like a movie that sets out to portray what happens when you or your loved ones get traumatized by extreme violence but it ends up getting stuck in a loop of stereotypical characters. The acting that comes with these characters isn’t half bad, but the writing that shows the motivation and background of the characters just isn’t good enough to make it all truly believable. If anything, the movie is alright to watch, but it doesn’t add anything new to what’s already out there on the market nor does it give you an unforgettable experience due to its mediocre script.

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Rating: 6.6/10 (9 votes cast)
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Rating: 0 (from 2 votes)
Rage (2021) (VOD) - Movie Review, 6.6 out of 10 based on 9 ratings
Icecreamvamp


I'm a game designer, developer, and reviewer. I've been reviewing for 3rd-strike.com since 2017.

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