One of the real finds at South By Southwest Film & TV this year was the premiere of the Midnighters selection MONOLITH which enjoyed a completely sold out attendance at the Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar location and where I was hiding behind a massive bowl of buttered popcorn for the duration.
ABOUT: A bold science fiction thriller featuring one woman, one location, and a mystery uncovered through audio – in which a young journalist discovers a strange artifact and begins to convince herself it is evidence of an alien conspiracy. Recently disgraced and desperate for a story, The Interviewer holes herself up in her parents’ luxurious home and gets to work on the only job she can get – hosting a clickbait investigative podcast. When she receives an anonymous email leading her to a retired housekeeper who claims her life has been destroyed by a strange black brick, The Interviewer embarks on a mystery that leads her down a rabbit hole of truth and lies at the heart of her own story.
JASON’S REACTION: Reaction: Taking place entirely in one place, MONOLITH works incredibly well thanks to SxSW “It” girl Lily Sullivan who legit carries the entire movie on her shoulders as her character, simply called “The Interviewer”, is disgraced after a former job and gets a simple email that changes everything. Where this goes I would never want to reveal, but it goes in dark and twisted ways all the while staying at this one house and filmmaker Matt Vesely gets a lot of mileage out of keeping the house dark, brooding and even with a strong visual image that holds over the house (and gave me a Stanley Kubrick vibe). Sullivan too will no doubt be one of the biggest stars out of SxSW this year with such an expressive, intricate piece of acting both here and a few nights ago in EVIL DEAD RISE. This is having a late screening in the festival so don’t miss it if you are still here, and even though it doesn’t have a distributor yet I hope this finds a small but notable release later in the year.
This film and many others like it will be showing at South By Southwest taking place March 10-19. For more information point your browser to www.sxsw.com!