Solace Blu-ray Review
Jeremy Werner
June 7th, 2017
According to various Internet sources, SOLACE was at one point, a sequel to SE7EN. The title was going to be EI8HT and the link was going to be Morgan Freeman’s character, Detective Somerset. It was supposedly to be about Somerset discovering psychic powers and tracking down a new killer. The idea was dropped because everyone, and rightfully so, thought SE7EN was a powerful stand-alone film and that a sequel would simply taint its originality. So after years on the shelf and a couple of rewrites, we’re left with SOLACE.
Anthony Hopkins is once again helping the FBI, but not as Hannibal the Cannibal. His character in SOLACE, is John Clancy, a former doctor who previously helped his FBI pal, Agent Joe (Dean Morgan). Clancy took a sabbatical after his daughter died. Her death left Clancy emotionally scarred and frustrated with life. Joe is tracking down a peculiar serial killer, who’s targeting a precise group of people and killing them with an even more distinct method.
Joe introduces Clancy to Agent Katherine (Cornish), who’s reluctant, but open to having a psychic track down a serial killer who seems to be intentionally leaving breadcrumbs with the hope of authorities catching up to him. But Clancy isn’t so sure that the breadcrumbs are anything meaningful. He slowly comes to the realization that the man they’re hunting is also a psychic, but possibly more powerful than Clancy. If this sounds silly, it is.
SOLACE starts out promising enough. There have been plenty of movies and TV shows where the inclusion of a psychic generally raises more philosophical questions rather than creating an unbelievable supernatural element. An episode of THE X-FILES comes to mind where the agents enlist a psychic who seemingly hates his powers and reacts sardonically to the pursuit of the serial killer. But everyone in SOLACE takes the psychic powers plot way to seriously, as if there isn’t a serious doubt about people with psychic abilities. It’s not until we finally get to meet the killer that the script is flipped.
SOLACE has trace bits of DNA that make it feel like a spiritual sequel to SE7EN. There’s some unique murders and bubbling tension between the psychic and detectives. There are a lot of crime scene moments that are actually original in nature. They conjure feelings of genuine intrigue because we’re watching a psychic piece together the crime and the culprit at the same time in a slow-motion rapid pace sequence. The serial killer’s arrival actually ends up killing the originality as we enter the third act.
SOLACE has some decent performances from its cast, despite how cheesy the concept inherently is. The direction of the movie is surprisingly solid, despite a lackluster script. The director managed to wring out some drips of creativity from a humdrum crime thriller. For the first half, SOLACE is an entertaining psychological thriller with underlying supernatural themes. But once those themes drown out the thriller aspect, it slowly becomes a parody of itself and
SOLACE falls apart before the end credits.
BLU RAY REVIEW
Video: (1080p HD Widescreen 2:41:1) There’s a lot of visually striking moments in this movie that are captured wonderfully on this blu-ray. The striking religious symbols and subtle noir qualities come through clearly.
Audio: (English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1) The audio is fairly balanced and well-mixed, until someone draws a gun, then it sounds like your TV is yelling at you.
Commentary with Director Afonso Poyart: The commentary starts out strong, with Poyart running down a lot of the themes and ideas he presented in the movie. But as the movie progresses he runs out of topics of conversation and it becomes a reactionary track to specific scenes and him building upon previous visual messages. He inevitably allows for some of his favorite scenes to speak instead of talking over them.
Visions and Voices: The Making of SOLACE (8:40): This is what you would come to expect from a behind the scenes look at the film. There are various interviews with the cast and crew, talking about the project and what it means to them.
SOLACE Trailer
