Sean Spencer’s debut, about a journalist who sees something he shouldn’t in the tower block opposite, piles on sodium-flooded dread with a script that kicks
It’s great to see a role for a black Londoner that doesn’t involve repping any endz, and David Gyasi (Cloud Atlas, Interstellar) capably anchors this piece of East End noir, playing a traumatised music journalist who gets a Rear Window-style peek of a kidnapping in the tower block across the way. A little under-plotted in its dip into the immigrant-labour demimonde explored most comprehensively by Stephen Frears’s Dirty Pretty Things in 2002, Sean Spencer’s debut feature is still carried off with sharp-eyed poise. Carl Burke’s cinematography thrives in this sodium-flooded twilight world; Spencer not only shows an aptitude for staging violence with everyday household items, but more importantly writes coiled, guarded dialogue that mordantly funnels his characters down dead ends of the soul.
It’s great to see a role for a black Londoner that doesn’t involve repping any endz, and David Gyasi (Cloud Atlas, Interstellar) capably anchors this piece of East End noir, playing a traumatised music journalist who gets a Rear Window-style peek of a kidnapping in the tower block across the way. A little under-plotted in its dip into the immigrant-labour demimonde explored most comprehensively by Stephen Frears’s Dirty Pretty Things in 2002, Sean Spencer’s debut feature is still carried off with sharp-eyed poise. Carl Burke’s cinematography thrives in this sodium-flooded twilight world; Spencer not only shows an aptitude for staging violence with everyday household items, but more importantly writes coiled, guarded dialogue that mordantly funnels his characters down dead ends of the soul.
- 11/17/2016
- by Phil Hoad
- The Guardian - Film News
★★★☆☆ In a city of millions, it isn't right but it's easy to turn a blind eye to the suffering of others. Lost in an ocean of lives lived from 9 to 5, spent peering into mobile phone screens, behind closed doors or simply through a blinkered field of vision, a lot goes unseen, unnoticed and unresolved. It's in this world - and more specifically a Tottenham housing estate - that writer-director Sean Spencer sets Panic, his impressive debut feature. A very human crime drama that tackles the brutality of people smuggling and champions the plight of those powerless to escape its grip, Spencer's film further resonates within the claustrophobic psychological confines of its protagonist's mind and body.
- 11/17/2016
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
Brit actor David Gyasi stars in “Panic,” headlining the thriller that’s been called “a 21st century ‘Rear Window'” (referencing the Alfred Hitchcock classic), which is directed by Sean Spencer. In the film, Gyasi plays music journalist Andrew Deeley, who lives in a… Continue Reading →...
- 11/8/2016
- by shadowandact
- ShadowAndAct
Brit actor David Gyasi stars in “Panic,” headlining the thriller that’s been called “a 21st century ‘Rear Window'” (referencing the Alfred Hitchcock classic), which is directed by Sean Spencer. In the film, Gyasi plays music journalist Andrew Deeley, who lives in a… Continue Reading →...
- 9/20/2016
- by shadowandact
- ShadowAndAct
David Gyasi Will Fight To Save A Kidnapped Woman He's Infatuated With In 'Panic' Continue Reading →...
- 8/12/2016
- by shadowandact
- ShadowAndAct
On the heels of yesterday's news that he'd joined the cast of Christopher Nolan's super-secret sci-fi project Interstellar, Brit actor David Gyasi will be starring in an upcoming thriller titled Panic - his first true starring role, as he headlines the film which is directed by Sean Spencer, and is currently listed as being in post-production after a later 2012 shoot. In the film, Gyasi plays music journalist Andrew Deeley, who lives in a high-rise tower block, cut off from the world, psychologically scarred after a vicious attack. He becomes infatuated with one his neighbors, Kem, a beautiful young Chinese woman. When Amy, a married woman he meets online, witnesses...
- 7/31/2013
- by Tambay A. Obenson
- ShadowAndAct
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