 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: Last Radio Call • Year: 2021 • Country: USA • Director: Isaac Rodriguez • Main cast: Sarah Froelich, Jason Scarbrough, June Griffin Garcia, Ali Alkhafaji, Keekee Takatsuki • Runtime: 75 minutes • Production company: No Sleep Films • TRAILER
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Last Radio Call (2021) could be described as a hybrid between the found-footage style and the fake documentary. The similarities with The Blair Witch Project (1999) end after the first couple of minutes of the film, where we see the last recording of the body cam of official David Serling and we move to the narrations of his wife Sarah. And that is what will accompany us for most of the rest of the running time of the movie, as she hires a camera dude to follow her through the investigations related to the disappearance of her husband.
Almost the entire film is held by the performance of the debutant Sarah Froelich, which is kinda something to outstand not only because this is the first time she has been in front of a camera in a movie but also because of her acting work is honestly above the average. Her portrait of a desperate woman, whose period of grief and confusion is gone and one year after the disappearance of her husband she is nothing but hungry for the truth, is quite powerful. Perhaps we are too accustomed to weak easy-scary protagonists that would shit on their pants at the first sight of a scary supernatural happening in the pitch darkness, but she doesn’t. Her will is strong, and that strength keeps the movie together.
The development of the story follows the character of Sarah as she goes from a start point where all she has is a couple of names she got by a police force that neglected her and the case, and how deep she digs into the occult, ancient Native American legends, and the dark history of the building where her husband disappeared. A small mystery that escalates into a pure tale of horror as the volume of frightening increases as new hints are discovered.
Last Radio Call (2021) has the flaws of an independent low-budget film, almost amateur and done by a very reduced group of friends, but it also has the strength of being a film made by lovers of the horror genre. The story might be a puzzle built with pieces taken from many other films, not being the most original one we’ve seen, but it still has a personality of its own. A risky exercise of filmmaking leaning on the main character most of the time alone on the screen that results more positive than one might have anticipated at first.
As it was said at the beginning of this review, the comparison between Last Radio Call (2021) and The Blair Witch Project (1999) is inevitable. In fact, that has been one of the lines used to promote the film. But, being fair, Last Radio Call (2021) is much better than The Blair Witch Project (1999) in pretty much all the aspects. A very recommendable watch for the lovers of found-footage and fake documentary films, and of independent horror in general.
RATE: 5/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt14569490
