Crumb Catcher, 2023.
Directed by Chris Skotchdopole.
Starring Rigo Garay, Ella Rae Peck, John Speredakos, Lorraine Farris, and Rebecca Watson.
SYNOPSIS:
A pair of newlyweds are blackmailed by the waiter and bartender from their wedding reception.
Newlyweds Shane (Rigo Garay) and Leah (Ella Rae Peck) are celebrating the happiest day of their lives at their wedding reception when a woozy Shane has a bout of nerves and has to disappear for a bit. Cue the inevitable hangover the next morning and Shane can’t remember a thing, but the couple get their things together and leave for their honeymoon, staying in Leah’s boss’ huge isolated house. All is going well, apart from the messages that Shane is receiving on his mobile phone intimating that something happened the previous night, and when a video file showing what he got up to is sent he goes into a panic. Then there is a knock at the door…
Crumb Catcher is the full-length feature debut for filmmaker Chris Skotchdopole and comes with the backing of indie genre icon Larry Fessenden, who is credited as co-writer and producer, and the movie does immediately have the feel of Fessenden all over it thanks to its dark Americana themes and absurd premise. The knock at the door comes from John (John Speredakos) and his wife Rose (Lorraine Farris), who were the waiter and bartender respectively at the wedding reception, and they are there on the pretence that John is returning the missing wedding cake that nobody really cares about.
Leah and Shane are good people and let him in, but soon regret their decision when he won’t leave, his friendly but overbearing manner causing forcing them to be polite. This being Leah’s honeymoon she is desperate to get rid of John but doesn’t seem to understand why Shane won’t just throw him out, and the combination of John Speredakos brilliantly cringey performance and the writing that reveals everyone except for Leah – Shane, John, Rose and us – is in on what is going on is as gripping as it is darkly humerous, that humour coming from the fact that John is trying to blackmail Shane to invest in his ‘Crumb Catcher’ invention.
Obviously, John and Rose believe the newlyweds to be rich, as they live in a huge house with lots of paintings, have an envelope full of cash from the wedding and Shane is a writer, but the script drip feeds certain nuggets of information along the way to let let us know that John is barking up the wrong tree, such as Shane is a writer but he hasn’t yet had his first book published as Leah is making that happen through her work, because her boss is a publisher.
So we know the setup and who/what each character is, but the tense atmosphere that is created in the first two acts doesn’t last as the third act – when all sins shall be revealed – is something of a let-down, ending on a relatively low-key note that is at odds with the huge setup and even bigger performance from John Speredakos. Unfortunately, Speredakos is doing most of the heavy lifting throughout as the other actors are fairly bland and their characters unlikeable, with Rigo Garay only coming to life whenever Shane gets angry, which isn’t often enough given the situation.
When he is playing it quiet and withdrawn, Garay just isn’t convincing and Shane as a character is fairly empty, obviously having a background but we don’t really know any of it apart from his father is a wrong ‘un and he has tattoos so he probably has a shady past himself. Leah doesn’t fare much better, given nothing to do in the final act when the script hinted at her turning the tables on her blackmailers shortly before, and the uneven tone veers from tense thriller to dark comedy very awkwardly, with only John Speredakos apparently having read the assignment.
The disc comes backed with a couple of Chris Skotchdopole’s short films, and whilst he obviously does know how to make a movie, you can clearly see the influence of Larry Fessenden in Crumb Catcher compared to those. There is enough here to enjoy for a casual watch if you were scrolling through the streaming menus and it popped up, but whilst it must be exciting for its director to have his debut movie released on physical media – and on a boutique label such as Arrow Video to boot – if you were to fork out for a Blu-ray on a blind buy you may well end up being a little disappointed when the final credits roll as it runs out of steam long before it finally ends.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Chris Ward
