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Young boy David (a winning performance by Joey Lawrence of the TV show "Blossom") is spending the week with his estranged, hard-working father Bill (the always solid Cliff De Young) and new stepmother Ellen (a fine Roxanne Hart). David notices that the electricity in the house has taken on a lethal and malevolent life of its own, but can't convince either his dad or stepmom that something's amiss.
Writer/director Paul Golding makes this fantastic premise seem fairly credible and extremely chilling by carefully evoking a thoroughly plausible everyday mundane world that's ripped violently asunder by a bizarre and inexplicable phenomenon (Golding's stubborn refusal to provide some kind of valid explanation for why the electricity is acting up adds a truly eerie and unnerving ambiguity to the picture). Moreover, Golding successfully creates believable and sympathetic characters and offers a gradual build-up of skin-crawling tension which culminates in a positively harrowing and nerve-wracking climax with all the electricity going dangerously haywire. Peter Lyons Collister's exceptional macro photography, Jay Ferguson's shuddery score, and the first-rate special effects further contribute to the film's sterling quality. Kudos are also in order for the uniformly ace acting; veteran character actor Charles Tyner has a colorfully quirky supporting part as a nutty old paranoid electrician and Robert Romanus (Mike Damone in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High") pops up in a cool cameo as a smooth-talking TV repairman. Spooky and intense, "Pulse" rates as a real nifty little sci-fi/horror sleeper.
score 8/10
Woodyanders 19 May 2006
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1371389/ |
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15-3-2021 12:07:03