AWAKEN THE SHADOWMAN (2017)

Studio:       Gravitas Ventures
Director:    J.S. Wilson
Writer:       Woodrow Wilson Hancock III, Skyler Caleb, James Zimbardi
Producer:  Anthony C. Ferrante, Woodrow Wilson Hancock III, Skyler Caleb, James Zimbardi
Stars:     James Zimbardi, Skyler Caleb, Emily Somers, Andrea Hunt, Robert R. Shafer, Raam Weinfeld, Sophie Labelle, Casey Kramer, Carlos Pratts, Grace Van Dien, Jean Smart

Review Score:

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Summary:

His mother’s disappearance compels a family man to return to his hometown, where he uncovers a terrifying conspiracy.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

New Haven, Connecticut – 1964 – A woman attempts to escape with her baby, but is confronted by a group of townspeople and a mysterious shadow man.

Redding, California – Present Day – While at a Laundromat with his wife Beth and infant daughter Emma, struggling husband Adam Morris receives a phone call from his estranged brother Jake. Jake tells Adam that their mother Evette went missing and asks Adam to come back home.

Orcutt, California – Adam, Beth, and baby Emma arrive at Evette’s house, where they are greeted by Jake and his wife Christy. Also present are several family friends from a bereavement group called Gateways, including Evette’s neighbor Glenda and a strange teenage boy named Lawrence.

Later that evening, Christy briefly speaks to Beth about losing her son. Adam recalls a massive fire that killed many residents of Orcutt, including Adam and Jake’s father. Adam also has a nightmare of his wife stalked by the shadowman while entranced. In the morning, Christy gifts Beth with a necklace to wear.

Looking for leads regarding their mother’s disappearance, Adam and Jake go to a junkyard to confront Evette’s ex-boyfriend Tom. Tom and his surly associates turn the brothers away.

While the brothers are gone, Beth explores Evette’s hidden attic. Underneath sheets, Beth finds a collection of dolls with blacked-out eyes and the word “watchers” written on their faces. When Adam asks about the dolls later, Jake is forced to admit that Evette was mentally ill and suicidal.

The shadowman briefly manifest’s in Emma’s room. Beth mentions to Adam how she is envious of Jake and Christy’s wealth. The brothers later argue about their divergent life paths and the fact that Christy dated Adam before Jake married her.

Looking frantic and disheveled, former high school friend Angela comes to the house. Angela warns Adam to not trust anyone from Gateways. She also claims that Lawrence is a monster.

Adam and Beth attend a Gateways meeting conducted by Lawrence. Christy continues gradually seducing Beth with promises of having a more prosperous life.

Adam returns to the junkyard to confront Tom again. Tom’s cryptic comments are interrupted when Jake knocks him unconscious from behind. Meanwhile, the shadowman stalks Beth and her baby back at the house.

While driving home from the junkyard, Adam thinks he sees his mother in Glenda’s window. Adam forces his way inside the house and finds a charred corpse underneath a sheet. Glenda admits it is the body of her dead son, whom she mourns in bizarre fashion.

Adam continues to observe his wife and brother behaving furtively. He also tries confronting Lawrence in the street outside the house, but Lawrence suddenly vanishes.

While Gateways holds a secret meeting with members surrounding a small child, Adam tracks down Angela. Angela shows Adam her research indicating that Gateways has a long history of appearing in towns prior to disasters and then helping people recover afterward. However, as the people become prosperous again, their babies mysteriously vanish. Angela warns that Beth is being brainwashed and Emma is in danger.

Adam calls Beth to relay the warning, but discovers he is too late. Adam races back to the house and finds everyone gone, including Emma.

Adam returns to Gateways. Adam angrily confronts both Glenda and Jake about what is happening and where Emma is. Evette suddenly appears. Evette explains that everything had been orchestrated to bring Adam there so that he could be given the life he always wanted.

Adam is taken to a room where everyone from Gateways is assembled with Beth and Emma. Realizing what is about to take place, Adam vehemently protests. The shadowman appears, takes Adam’s baby, and vanishes.

In the aftermath, Adam goes into hiding. He dedicates himself to exposing Gateways and recovering his daughter.

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Review:

Adam hasn’t seen his brother Jake since a hometown fire took their lives down divergent paths of prosperity.  Adam and his wife now have an infant daughter, but not enough quarters for laundry.  Jake married Adam’s ex-girlfriend, and they have the wealth they always wanted, but their son was tragically taken from them.

Their paths are forced to reconnect however, now that their mother Evette has gone mysteriously missing.  Adam returns to his former family home to find his old neighborhood in a “Get Out” trance of oddly positive people for a place where so many loved ones died in a blaze.  It seems a bereavement group called “Gateways” has a cult-like grip on the community, and Adam soon suspects they may have something to do with mom vanishing.

Evette’s cagey ex-boyfriend Tom.  Gateways’ teenage guru Lawrence.  Adam’s half-crazed old classmate Angela.  There’s no shortage of strange behavior going on, with each stone overturned causing Adam to keep scratching his scalp.

A collection of dolls with blacked-out eyes found concealed in a crawlspace.  Dreams of a dark figure creeping over a child’s crib.  Something sinister is certainly afoot.  What’s worse, Jake’s wife Christy may be seducing Adam’s wife Beth into becoming a key part of the conspiracy.

There’s a good reason why “Awaken the Shadowman” plays like a patchwork quilt of disparate pieces that don’t fully stitch together.  J.S. Wilson, credited as director, is actually a pseudonym for three men who wrote and produced the movie.  (Two of whom also play the brothers.)  Too many minds with too many ideas explains how an unsatisfying story ends up sending half-formed concepts crashing into each other while snipping ends from subplot threads so they never see any payoff.

“Awaken the Shadowman” contains a kooky cult, small town secrets, creepy dolls with ominous markings, a supernatural shadow person, and next to no explanation for how any of it adds together.  End credits come with confusion over what the movie meant to do with its incomplete fiction other than introduce dangling mysteries with no resolutions.  What are the cult’s origins?  What does the word written on the dolls mean?  How is a certain someone connected to the shadow man?  The necklace?  The junkyard gang?  “Awaken the Shadowman” doesn’t follow anything through, leaving its audience going home in the dark.

Characters are crafted chiefly from costumes and makeup.  Their DNA is designed from stereotyped templates whether they make sense for relationship connections or not.

Jean Smart, in what I’d wager is the shortest onscreen appearance of her career, plays a well-manicured woman wearing a gaudy bauble around her neck and a perfectly cut ‘do fresh from the hairdresser.  Yet we are meant to believe her boyfriend is a gruff grease monkey straight from the Teller-Morrow garage.  We know he is bad news too, since his pals have scarred faces and tattooed chests.

Addle-brained Angela is cut from similarly clichéd cloth.  Her sketchiness is conveyed through purple eye sockets and holes in her shirt.  I’m not sure why her peculiar obsession would give her the appearance of a homeless heroin addict, but the movie doesn’t come up with any better ways to express who she is.

The film is mostly mediocre as opposed to outright awful.  But with nothing notable acting as a counterbalance, sore thumb shortcomings simply stand out even more.  Douglas Pipes’ strange musical score is distractingly overbearing.  Plot progression is a scavenger hunt ping-ponging Adam from dead end to dead end.

“Awaken the Shadowman” also sports warts from some severely spotty amateur acting.  No need to name names.  Should you watch the movie for yourself, you’ll quickly single out the suspects when you involuntarily react with a scrunched face and inhaled hiss at certain performances.

More imitative than inspired, “Awaken the Shadowman” steps up to the plate with the confident ambition of a low-budget indie.  Then it squares up to bunt with two strikes, promptly fouling into an out.

Review Score:  45

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