"The Abandon" Review: Sci-Fi Drama offers an intriguing story

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Carrying a majority of a feature by yourself in an isolated area feels like a difficult assignment for an actor. In the past few years, actors like Tom Hanks and Robert Redford have thrived doing it in Castaway and All is Lost respectively. 

In the new film The Abandon (now available on VOD), Jonathan Rosenthal is tasked with a similar job with mixed results.

Rosenthal stars as Miles Willis, an American soldier who is shot on the battlefield. Lying on the ground, he sees a great light above him and is transported to an isolated room with no windows or exits. For much of the feature, Willis remains in that cubic room by himself as he tries to find a way out of the mysterious prison.

Writer Dwain Worrell offers an interesting concept here and to his credit, Rosenthal helps make it work. For approximately the first twenty minutes or so, the actor remains in the room with no one to talk to as he assesses the situation and deals with the room’s abrupt changes, from its incredible temperature changes to the layout of the room changing underneath his feet.

After the twenty minutes mark, Willis finds a way to communicate with Damsey (Tamara Perry), an unknown and unseen stranger, over a walkie talkie and that sets up a whole new dynamic for the remainder of the story.   

The story unfolds like a mystery with Willis — alongside the audience — attempting to figure out the clues in the room itself and understand why he’s been placed there. There are a number of twists and turns here in both the room and in the story that are intriguing enough to keep the momentum going.

Despite the setting remaining the same for the vast majority of the feature’s 97 minute run time, the writer manages to maintain the story's momentum and that keeps it from becoming monotonous.

Director Jason Satterlund does a notable job capturing the room itself. There isn’t much to look at in the nearly-empty cube but Satterlund never lets the limited space become a hindrance to the plot. It helps that Rosenthal does such a fine job keeping the audience’s attention with little around him to work with. Rosenthal captures the growing frustration, heartbreak and even despair of a wounded and confused character who doesn’t know if he will ever escape captivity.

The mysteries of the first two acts here lead up to the third act, which does include a few notable and unexpected turns. The final act resolves some of the core questions here but the conclusion isn’t as satisfying as one would hope especially since the whole story has been building up to the third act revelations.

Throughout its runtime, The Abandon provides plenty of intrigue and interest. It’s a feature that slowly reveals its clues and will likely keep its audience engaged. The plot is intriguing enough even though it never seems to fulfill its full potential, which might leave the audience a bit unsatisfied by the end result.

 Although the third act surprises aren’t as strong as they could’ve been, there’s enough to like about the feature to check it out especially now that it’s arrived on video on demand.