It’s a dilemma any writer faces, wondering how influential their work might become. Will it inspire greatness or conjure evil? Plenty of books have led the worst in society to go the route of evil, serial killers and madmen copycatting the plots of famous paperback stories. Naturally, their exploits make it to the movies as well. That’s where we find ourselves with writer/director Andrew Hunt‘s latest feature, The Infernal Machine, a curious, claustrophobic thriller with a few promising twists that ultimately mismanages the message, even as it stays entertaining.
Bruce Cogburn (Guy Pearce) wrote a book. A good one, a best seller in fact, a tragedy called “The Infernal Machine”. Dwight Tufford (Alex Pettyfer) liked it too, so much so that he decided to pick up a gun and do just as described in the story, commit a brutal mass shooting. The book is pulled off shelves and over the next twenty five years, Cogburn goes into hiding, living in isolation in the desert, getting drunk and slipping into apparent madness. However, one persistent writer has tracked him down, sending him letters every single day, forcing Cogburn to get to a phone booth and begin a long series of alcohol-fueled rants into an answering machine. But that’s only the beginning, as soon he becomes obsessed with learning who is toying with him, gaining the favor of a cop named Higgins (Alice Eve), who finds his conspiratorial attitude magnetic. Or does she?
Is Bruce going insane? That’s the question Hunt wants us to ask, the writer holed up in his run down house with a sniper rifle, ironically what his main character used in his book. He becomes convinced that the man sending him letters is someone called “William DuKent”, somehow now taunting him more than two decades later. It’s an intriguing idea, loaded with some clever ideas that lead Bruce on a strange journey of discovery that seems to suggest he’s being stalked by someone bent on revenge.
The movie purposefully parts ways with a certain level of reality, perhaps even logic the further Cogburn ventures down his path, a few moments feeling more staged for effect than ground in Bruce’s seeming decline. What begins as a taunt personal struggle, escalates into a complicated game of odd twists and turns that by the halfway point has Cogburn visiting Tufford in prison, which is admittedly a particularly good sequence, even as Hunt opts for style over authenticity. However, it gets a little clumsy with its conclusion.
Pearce is a good choice, lean, ragged, and convincing, his ability to sell paranoia and skepticism dating back to his electrifying performance in Christopher Nolan‘s superior Memento. And that’s a fairly good comparison, Hunt’s film stuffed with odd clues and a ‘hero’ always in question of what he’s learning. Pearce is on screen for most of the runtime and carries the sometimes cumbersome story with an energized mania. It’s just too bad the film itself can’t seem to find the tone and momentum to match.
As thrillers go, The Infernal Machine has all the right parts but lacks wonder, even as it layers one weird mystery on top of the other. It’s hard to pinpoint where it weakens most, between a few uninspired conflicts to a bland set of supporting characters, save for a near comically dark performance from Jeremy Davies. I could have done without an actual Rube Goldberg device was well, feeling like it was something from a mid-90s plot device, however, there is a sturdy thread of curiosity about it all that keeps it just interesting enough to watch. Watch it for the fine work of Pearce.