From the producers of “47 meters down”, Fall is a movie with a fairly basic concept that actually manages to deliver a pretty nail-biting edge-of-your-seat experience. And, if you’re afraid of heights, it’s going to feel like you’re watching a horror movie! When I first saw the teaser trailer for this, I thought it was one of the most simple but effective trailers I’d seen in a long while and while I do feel that the full-length trailer gave away a little too much, it didn’t spoil my overall enjoyment.
In the opening scene, Becky (Grace Caroline Currey) is scaling a mountain along with her husband Dan (Mason Gooding) and best friend Hunter (Virginia Gardner). A freak accident sees Dan tragically fall to his death, turning Becky’s life upside down. When we join her almost one year later later, it’s clear that she’s still grieving hard – a package containing Dan’s ashes lies unopened among the mess in her apartment, she’s regularly drinking in bars and calling Dan’s mobile number just to hear his voicemail message. Even Dad (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) is having a hard time connecting with her.
And then Hunter offers what she believes is the perfect solution in order to try and help Becky confront the fear of climbing she developed ever since the accident. Hunter is planning on driving out to the middle of the desert and attempting to scale an old 2000ft radio tower while recording footage for her large social media following, and she wants Becky to join her. She even suggests taking Dan’s ashes up there and scattering them into the wind to commemorate the first anniversary of his death, a way of rebooting her life and getting back on track. It doesn’t take much persuading and it’s not long before both girls are heading off to the base of the tower to begin their descent.
There are certainly plenty of early warning signs that they should just stop what they’re doing and go home immediately. The fence around the tower says “No Trespassing: Danger of Death”, not to mention the ladder rung which snaps off after they’ve barely left the ground. The tower itself is a rusty old thing, with supports that are shaking in their foundations and nuts and bolts rattling loose as the girls climb. But still, they continue, reminding us just how high they’re climbing when they mention that they’ve passed the height of the Eiffel Tower. And they’re only halfway up!
It’s when the climbing shifts to the outside of the tower and it begins to narrow to a point that disaster strikes, with both girls finding themselves stranded on a tiny platform with no ladder to get back down. And without any phone signal, the sun beating down on them and nobody that knows their whereabouts, things don’t look good for their survival.
Despite being completely ridiculous and stretching itself to a little under two hours, Fall turned out to be an extremely enjoyable roller coaster ride and hats off to the filmmakers for the constant stream of unfortunate events and the way in which they’re dealt with. Aside from a couple of shaky CGI moments, there’s a real sense of peril conveyed and a feeling of vertigo which succeded in making my stomach flip. My nerves were in shreds by the end of it all, not bad for a movie which only cost $3 million dollars!
Signature Entertainment presents Fall exclusively in Cinemas from 2nd September
6.5
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Web developer by day, with a movie and TV watchlist that continues to grow as much as my spare time reduces! My favourite movie is Inception and, despite what everyone says, I do not have a man-crush on Tom Cruise.
