These Final Hours ** (2013, Nathan Phillips, Jessica De Gouw, David Field, Angourie Rice) – Movie Review

Writer-director Zak Hilditch’s enterprising Aussie thriller takes place on the last day on Earth, starting just 12 hours before a cataclysmic event will end life as we know it. It seems like a meteor has collided with Earth in the North Atlantic, leaving 12 hours until the global firestorm reaches Western Australia.

Nathan Phillips is quite a physical and acting presence as party boy and reluctant hero James, who starts off having sex for the last time with his lover Zoe (Jessica De Gouw) at her beach house. James disregards Zoe’s news that she’s pregnant with his child and makes his way across a lawless and chaotic city to the party to end all parties, reluctantly saving the life of a little girl named Rose (Angourie Rice), who is desperately searching for her father.

Well made, and well acted, this interesting movie is all about what really matters in life, but, as the end of the world is nigh, that all proves depressing and ultimately a bit pointless. It is quite an interesting 12 hours, though, all packed into a neat and compact 87 minutes. The desolation and destruction and firestorm are very well staged on a careful budget, filmed at Perth, Western Australia.

It is as much an emotional drama as a sci-fi apocalyptic thriller, so some audiences may feel entertained, involved and emotionally wrenched. That is the movie’s plan, anyway, though it’s a couple of cards short of a full deck.

Nathan Phillips is best known for his role as backpacker Ben Mitchell in Wolf Creek (2005).

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© Derek Winnert 2016 Movie Review
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