Imposters
The cosmos has a cruel way of balancing the scales of fate; a former police officer who was shot in the line of duty, had the bullet been only the thickness of a coin closer to his spine Paul Crouch would have been paralysed, but he was fortunate, his wife Marie finding out shortly after that she was pregnant, he moving to a job in insurance and they all moving to the quiet suburbs, a safer place to raise Theo.
Marie organising a party to meet the new neighbours, Paul puts Theo to sleep and steps away for a moment, the house shaking with a minor tremor, the crib now empty; searches of the forest find nothing, Police Chief Ezra Reid at a loss, local derelict Orson who grew up in the house offers a map to a hidden cave in the forest, Marie entering alone and returning bloodied but with her son, saying she can’t explain what happened, Paul and Orson both believing she is lying.
Imposters a slow burn of anxiety and distress written and directed by Caleb Phillips, things are not rosy for Paul and Marie (Charlie Barnett and Jessica Rothe) even before the inexplicable disappearance of their child in a house full of witnesses, he having recanted the already made decision to leave when she found out she was expecting but engaging in an affair with a co-worker while Marie blames him for leaving their son to take a call, inconsolable and irrational in her grief.
Orson (Bates Wilder) intrusive but regarded as harmless though by Exra (Yul Vasquez), his persistence only sparks suspicions, the parents inexpressibly grateful for the return of Theo in good health after two weeks, as mysterious as his disappearance, but conspicuously evasive in their answers to the police, while Marie herself is behaving strangely, keeping Theo and Charlie apart, trying to delay his realisation Theo no longer has a prominent birthmark on his foot.
Its UK premiere at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, Imposters is a different approach to many of the same ideas which informed the brilliant Redux Redux last year, but where before the audience were thrown into the mystery at the outset here it is not until half way through that the tumble down the twisted rabbit hole occurs, first Marie and then Paul gathering momentum as they fall further into a trap they have laid for themselves.
Paul a man who in memory of his injury makes decisions on the toss of a coin and the cave a crossroads of possibility, Imposters becomes more sinister as the tragedy unfolds, mistakes made and unable to be taken back, The X-Files exploring the Backrooms in a strange place where consequences echo without forgiveness, The Caucasian Chalk Nine Circles of Hell where blood sacrifice can’t heal the deeper wounds of the soul.
Edinburgh International Film Festival continues until Wednesday 19th August
