YOU'LL NEVER FIND ME (2023)

Studio:   Shudder
Director: Josiah Allen, Indianna Bell
Writer:   Indianna Bell
Producer: Christine Williams, Indianna Bell, Josiah Allen, Jordan Cowan
Stars:    Brendan Rock, Jordan Cowan

Review Score:

---

Summary:

Startling secrets are gradually exposed during a cat-and-mouse confrontation between a reclusive man and a mysterious stranger.

---

Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Patrick, who lives alone in a mobile home in an isolated trailer park, examines a small vial of what is later revealed to be GHB while drinking from a bottle of alcohol. During a raging rainstorm in the middle of the night, an unidentified woman comes to Patrick's door seeking temporary shelter. Patrick, who thinks the woman looks familiar, and the barefooted visitor both appear confused as to exactly how she got past the locked gate, although she curiously claims to have made her way to the trailer park after recovering from a drunken beach excursion.

Wary of Patrick's claims about not having a phone and his insistence on waiting out the storm in his trailer, the visitor still accepts an invitation to shower. During her shower, the woman momentarily imagines she sees blood pouring from her head.

Patrick prepares a bowl of soup for the visitor. Suspecting he drugged it, the woman covertly pours the soup into a boot. Patrick figures out what the woman did, but he brushes off her action as wisely cautious.

The visitor notices a bloody wound on Patrick's back while he works to repair a power outage. Searching the bathroom for something to treat Patrick's injury, the woman discovers a prescription pill bottle containing various earrings, including one she recognizes as missing from her ear.

The visitor confronts Patrick about the earring, which sparks another tense interaction between the two of them. Patrick tells the woman she is free to leave, but after turning the knob, she closes the door and decides to stay.

The visitor agrees to play cards with Patrick to pass the time. During their game, Patrick tells the story of how he supposedly met his deceased wife at a petrol station. Patrick concludes by telling the woman he has enjoyed having someone to talk to again. A subsequent toast prompts the visitor to finally drink from the cup Patrick poured for her earlier. The woman becomes alarmed when she sees a lipstick stain on the rim.

While Patrick is outside, a buzzing cellphone draws the visitor to a small space where she discovers another woman's dead body. Terrified, the woman tries to escape, but Patrick captures her, restrains her, and forces her to drink a fatal amount of GHB. Before the drugged woman seemingly dies, Patrick confesses that his story of the petrol station was actually how he met the victim that the visitor discovered. Now revealed as a serial killer, Patrick continues by recalling that his first victim was a woman he bludgeoned with a hammer after she knocked on his car door during a rainstorm seen in flashbacks.

Remembering that the visitor seemed familiar, Patrick finally realizes she was his first victim after he recognizes a distinctive heartbeat tattoo on her ribcage. Suddenly, Patrick enters a hallucinatory nightmare where previous victims terrorize, violently assault, and taunt him into drinking his own drugged alcohol while police sirens flash outside.

Just as suddenly, Patrick returns to reality, where his most recent victim still lies dead. Patrick answers a knock on his door, which turns out to just be annoying kids playing a prank. However, Patrick notices he is holding an empty GHB vial. Realizing he ingested it while hallucinating his entire experience that night, Patrick laughs. After he closes the door, Patrick's body is heard hitting the floor.

---

Review:

Facts first. Having played at Tribeca, Fantastic Fest, L.A.'s Screamfest, and other events around the world, "You'll Never Find Me" can be considered a bit of a "festival darling." The Australian film subsequently debuted digitally on Shudder, the horror streaming service with a longstanding reputation for acquiring international releases frequently describable as "arthouse," "atmospheric," and the ever-popular "slow burn."

Save for a few faces seen only briefly, the movie features just two actors. Save for a few cutaways to a car windshield drowning in rain and bookending establishing shots of the trailer, the movie also takes place entirely inside the cramped confines of a mobile home.

With no more than that small amount of information regarding the circuit it traveled, who picked it up, and its lean cast locked inside a single location, a pretty clear picture should have developed. "You'll Never Find Me" is obviously a claustrophobic chamber play with particular appeal to cinephiles who prefer their psychological thrillers to be more cerebral than visceral, and their interpretive climaxes to inspire "ending explained" videos. That's likely all anyone needs to hear to know if this is the kind of dark drama drink they'll either lap up or spit out. Regardless, I'll continue anyway.

Patrick lives alone in a trailer park. "Lives" might not be the best way to put it. Really, he's hiding from the rest of the world, tucked away as an anonymous hermit who wishes to be unbothered by any intrusions on his isolated existence.

He's getting a visitor whether he likes it or not, because a raging rainstorm has apparently made his remote home the closest refuge for an unidentified woman seeking shelter. Patrick finds it strange that she managed to make her way there in the middle of the night, and barefoot to boot. She claims she can't recall specific details of her evening, either. Stranger still, he thinks he recognizes her, but can't remember from where that might be or why she seems so familiar.

With this, the stage is set for a conversation-based game of cat and mouse as the two of them engage in various confrontations and accusations while trying to solve competing mysteries about who the other person is and what his/her true intentions are. "Stage" is an apt word since "You'll Never Find Me" operates identically to a three-act theater production. Patrick talks "at" the woman as much as he talks "with" her, occasionally monologuing catatonically as he reflects cryptically while wearing pensive expressions. Every so often, the camera cuts to a close-up of a faucet, or pans across the ceiling, not so much for the narrative, but perhaps because the directors and cinematographer recognized the need to show something other than these same two people talking the entire time.

MASSIVE SPOILER

Have you already guessed the story's secret based solely on the setup? At the 19-minute mark, I paused the movie to jot down a note. That note read simply: "If this turns out to be he's a serial killer and she's the ghost of one of his victims..." I didn't write a "then" for my "if," as I didn't think through what an appropriate punishment should be for "You'll Never Find Me" committing a predictable crime. I suppose the consequence is a lower score than other critics awarded, since I had to sit through the next hour and change with nearly all suspense deflated, stuck inside a "murderer hallucinates his comeuppance" scenario I've seen innumerable times before.

END SPOILER

"You'll Never Find Me" wants there to be seesawing suspicion regarding who's actually in danger and what's really going on, except there's never an authentic moment where it feels like the woman has something to lord over Patrick with an upper hand. Once that "who's the cat and who's the mouse?" question gets answered early, the only other questions that come up have to do with why the visitor has multiple opportunities to walk right out the front door, yet never takes them despite Patrick's apparent attempts to possibly drug her, seemingly steal personal effects, and the overall eeriness of her whole situation.

With the mystery flame flickered out, what remains of the movie is mostly mood made out of music, slow-motion shots, shadowed faces, and other understated creeps that mostly work, albeit in service of a story whose tired twist underwhelms. Both actors, Brendan Rock and Jordan Cowan, also turn in intense performances that keep the vibe as captivating as a two-person vehicle can be on this low-budget level. In the end, everything comes down to whether or not you can become enmeshed in the minor mystery and how much of an effect the moderately macabre mood has on you personally. For me, it was only "eh." For you, I hope it's "wow!"

Review Score: 60

---