Monolith

Virtually disgraced journalist Lily Sullivan - the interviewer according the IMDB – is now working for a podcast called Beyond Belief. Which is not going well as the stories aren’t coming and she is under some pressure to deliver. Emailed a story about a black brick from an anonymous source, the Interviewer begins an investigation.

That starts with a maid Floramae (Ling Cooper Tang) who recollects that about twenty years ago she was sacked over bad damage to a table that was blamed on her daughter. The case still runs deep with Floramae’s daughter haranguing the Interviewer about her call.

Digging deeper there’s the German art dealer Klaus (Terence Crawford) who claims to have number of the black bricks, and again initially helpful pushes back when questioned. As the story begins to develop and go around the world so there are more sightings of the mysterious brick, until one is delivered her home.

Set mostly in what is a high tech and luxurious house in Australia the film is not an easy watch. And that’s not because this is complicated story, either plot wise or that all the pressure in on lead Sullivan as the only person on screen, working and responding to callers and interviewees, a la Locke.

The main problem is that it is a very sterile film; cold and soulless that as intriguing as the story is there’s a detachment from Sullivan as a person. That’s probably due to director Matt Vesely (written by Lucy Campbell) putting a lot of emphasis on the tech and the grey hues of the film.

However this technical aspect of filmmaking doesn’t detract from Sullivan’s performance which is first rate as she gets closer to the truth behind the black bricks, and her anxiety starts to manifest. This an interesting debut feature from Vesely being modestly ambitious with the one actor and location set up, that technically works.

Monolith had its UK Premiere at London FrightFest 2023.