The Isolate Thief
3 stars (out of 4)
Starring Sean Bean, Mackenzie Foy, Joe Pantoliano, Odeya Rush, Ty Simpkins, Martin Sensmeir, and Jack Kesy
Language: English
Running time: 95 minutes
Available: In theaters
In cinema, a chamber piece is a tense drama in which a small group of people confront one another in a limited space. The genre extends even to Westerns. Instead of cavalrymen dashing across the open plains or a brave sheriff subduing payday ranch hands in a raucous saloon, we have emotional dialogue, duplicity, and double-dealing in a remote setting. The Hateful Eight and Bad Day at Black Rock come to mind. Even John Wayne’s classic Stagecoach is a chamber piece, with its motley characters confined to the claustrophobic interior of the eponymic vehicle as their true inner selves are slowly revealed.
The Isolate Thief is the latest entry into that world. The setting is a remote U.S. Army outpost in the snowy and distant Cascades of the Pacific Northwest, near the end of the Civil War. The post is manned by a teenager, Ada (Mackenzie Foy, of The Twilight Saga), whose Army officer father has recently died of pneumonia. Conditions are too harsh for a young woman alone, so Ada prepares to leave for Astoria, there to board a ship or a stage for San Francisco, where she may have relatives.
The pace is intentionally slow. Ada slops the hogs, fights off a lone wolf (symbolism alert!), and makes a final entry into her late father’s logbook. Before she can begin her journey, though, a mysterious stranger, Perry (played with creepy jumpiness by Joe Pantoliano) arrives. Perry seems to be running away from someone or something. He finally leaves, but not before hiding a small treasure, which Ada discovers.
She also discovers a grisly scene as she begins her journey: a group of Union soldiers has been brutally wiped out, several of them stripped of their uniforms. Amid the carnage, she finds a beautiful young woman more dead than alive. Ada returns with her to the outpost and nurses her back to health.
Sean Bean, leading a ragtag trio of soldiers, arrives at the outpost. He introduces himself as Colonel John Good, or “Fiddler” as his men call him. He speaks to Ada in the courtly, mannered style of the 19th century. An odd father-daughter relationship seems in the offing. The men, too, treat Ada with respect and civility, but handle the other young woman, Emily, like a prostitute. Emily, we learn, had been traveling with the soldiers for some time, cooking their meals, and serving as a sex slave, but was left for dead at the battlefield.
Things take a turn when Ada asks Fiddler John if the uniforms he and his men are wearing were taken from the dead soldiers she found. Soon the ruffians suspect that Ada has their stolen loot. Fiddler’s language with Ada becomes coarser. The men abuse Emily with abandon. Violence seems certain, and it isn’t long in coming.
The casting in The Isolate Thief (why not the “isolated” thief instead of this awkward title?) is strong indeed. Veteran actor Sean Bean (known mainly for costume dramas like Game of Thrones, The Lord of the Rings, and the TV series Sharpe) is in fine form as Fiddler. He seems to be having a blast as a rotter, a savage lurking beneath a veneer of decorum. Mackenzie Foy as Ada is credible. She grows from defenseless to defiant in a below-the-surface style of acting that can easily be misread as one-note, but is in fact a mature and suitable way to play this pivotal role. A standout in the film is Odeya Rush as the comely but hardened Emily. Her resemblance to Mila Kunis is eerie. With her smoldering gaze, toughness, acting skills, and good looks, she is a doozy in this movie.
When the lone wolf later appears again, some in the audience will roll their eyes at the heavy-handed metaphor. It was rare misstep in an otherwise laudable script by Kevin Lefler and the direction of John Suits.
Suits is better known for his shorts and TV commercials than for feature films, but he handles The Isolate Thief with great aplomb. The pacing progresses methodically from sleepy to savagery with the timing of a train pulling slowly out of a station before hitting a speed of 150 mph.
Equally good is the restrained and impactful cinematography by director of photography Will Stone. Despite the glorious mountain scenery, the colors are muted. The shadow of claustrophobia is everywhere, from the interior of the tiny outpost to a snowy trail hemmed in by mountain hemlock and subalpine fir.
Bloody scenes abound in The Isolate Thief. The threat of violence is pervasive. The ultimate partnership of Emily and Ada is gratifying, but what can two unarmed, young women do against four ruthless gunmen? The question of who survives and who doesn’t makes the finale a thriller.
Author Bio:
Mark Orwoll writes about film, food, and travel for Highbrow Magazine.
For Highbrow Magazine