In terms of trends in horror movie victims, backpackers are the new black. Young travellers have copped it in Wolf Creek, Turistas and the Hostel movies. Now they’re in peril again in Gone.
Gone has a British backpacker named Alex arriving in Sydney and striking up an uneasy friendship with a charismatic American who calls himself Taylor. The two blokes head north to meet up with Alex’s girlfriend Sophie – but they soon learn that three’s a crowd.
Alex quickly comes to suspect that Taylor is a sociopath trying to get him out of the picture so he can have his way with Sophie. But is he?
Horrors and thrillers often come with cartoon characters thrust into a rapidly accelerating nightmare. Gone distinguishes itself by taking time to set up its trio and then takes a slow-burn approach.
The film works best when it has us second guessing ourselves as to whether Taylor really is a master manipulator or Alex is just a paranoid whiner. Gone should’ve kept this intrigue going longer because Scott Mechlowicz plays his part so smoothly that it’s unsettling.
Amelia Warner is also good. I liked that her devotion to Alex felt deep-rooted – she doesn’t abandon the relationship. But God knows, anyone else would’ve cut him loose. That’s because Shaun Evans’ Alex is so annoying that I was close to being on the side of the villain – and that’s a real problem for any movie.
British commercials director Ringan Ledwidge strives hard to show outback Australia in a different light. He goes for desaturation and dustiness, rather than blue skies and crimson earth. For me, that made some of the film visually flat, but the approach works in the second half when the lifelessness of the landscape becomes as oppressive as the threat from Taylor.
Gone does reward us with a tense, grim finale but what the journey needed was greater ambiguity, a jaw-dropping reveal and a hero whose side we were on.
For its focus on suspense in a genre that too often goes straight for the jugular, Gone rates three stars.
