Impulse Reviews

A strange chiller that will foster only half-hearted audience response, confusion, and disappointment at feeling cheated. There is something compelling about the film that keeps one's interest up to a point, but exactly what that something is may be hard to fathom. In the small town of Sutcliffe, the locals are milling around on Main Street when the area experiences a mild earthquake. The people shrug it off and go about their business. Former resident Tilly lives in a big city with Matheson, a bright young doctor. Tilly has a good relationship with her mother (Vozoff), so she is shocked when her mother phones and starts to abuse her verbally. The call ends with Mom putting a gun to her head and pulling the trigger. Matheson and Tilly race to the hospital in the tiny town, where Vozoff is miraculously still alive. A brief shashay around town reveals that things aren't really peaceful or normal. The pacing is slow and the narrative often muddy, but there is no faulting the major performers, all of whom treat their scenes with the respect due lines written by Shakespeare. IMPULSE isn't a terrible movie; it just isn't terribly good, either.