Desert's Edge (1997) (TV)

User Rating:

4.3/10   

Director:

Rob Lowe

Writer:

Rob Lowe (writer)

Release Date:

25 June 1997 (USA)

Genre:

Short | Crime | Drama | Thriller

Plot Keywords:

Beautiful Woman

Cast

Matt Frewer	...	Greg
Poppy Montgomery	...	Mary
Jay Thomas	...	Hewitt
Angela Alvarado	...	Cheyenne
Diana Bellamy
Blayn Barbosa
Micah Dyer
Meredith Gordon
Beth Grant
Jim Haynie
Brad William Henke		(as Brad Henke)
Eric Poppick
Lee Whittaker
Brad Wyman

Runtime:

30 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Filming Locations:

Lancaster, California, USA

Company:

Chanticleer Films

Effective but may disappoint some viewers

Greg is on probation for violent conduct and awaiting a custody battle to get visitation rights to his son. Mary is an aspiring actress, although she can barely manage to win fodder roles in cheap slasher movies. The two meet on a trip across the desert on their way to do a modelling shoot for a gun advertisement. On the way, Greg's violent character comes out - something that becomes an even greater problem with what transpires.

This short film was written and directed by Lowe and he deserves both credit and blame for the various aspects of the film that work or don't. The film starts out by giving us an understanding of the characters' background - their temperaments and characters. At this point we still don't really know why they are together or where they are going, but it keeps us interested and keeps the short moving along nicely.

Thanks to the character background to Greg we know, when the action happens, just how much trouble he is in. This is exciting and from then becomes the focus of the film. The only downside of this is that it doesn't give a satisfactory ending; it gives a quite smart ending but not a totally satisfying one - but then this is a short film. Rather than see this as a full story, it is best viewed as a snapshot that happens to focus on a very sudden moment in the lives of Greg and Mary. The cast are good, particularly Frewer in the lead role, Montgomery and Thomas are good in support but it is Frewer that holds it together and makes it work.

Lowe delivers a good script that only struggles with the specifics like the ending, he directs well despite using quite basic locations and sets. Overall this is a short film and it has the sort of limitations that you would rightly expect to find; however it is still worth seeing for a solid story and good performances even if the ending is a little too pat and unsatisfactory - although it is to Lowe's credit that I was left wanting to know more.