No Fixed Abode *** (2012, Patrick Baladi, Saskia Butler, Sean Connolly) – Movie Review

Patrick Baladi stars as Adam. who goes to bed in his nice, comfy home alone, leaving his beautiful wife Jane (Saskia Butler) and daughter cosily asleep together in the next room. But, next day, he wakes up in an anonymous room in a hostel for the homeless.

How the hell did he get there and how can he get his life back? He still has his clothes and the watch his wife gave him for his birthday and he remembers where he lives lived?). That’s all.

This terrifying start to a low-budget (£300,000) British thriller/drama has strong commitment all round from Baladi and Butler and the other actors, as well as especially from writer-director Steve Rainbow. Baladi is a good actor and really is convincing in the role, and Rainbow gives his character the right, credible things to do. Both film and script, as well as all the actors have credibility. It doesn’t feel fake or forced, or only a movie, or just another London thriller.

Rainbow succeeds strongly in showing how easily your world can crumble and you can end up in the gutter with no one interested to help. It doesn’t work so well as a thriller, but it works satisfyingly as a Kafkaesque kind of nightmare and portrait of a man in an advanced stage of mental collapse.

With stronger film technique and better script development, this could have been a real winner, but, even as it is now, it is 75 minutes of your time well spent. Its shining warm spirit and good intentions stand out and make up for any shortcomings.

© Derek Winnert 2013 derekwinnert.com