Redux Redux, 2025.
Written and Directed by Matthew McManus and Kevin McManus.
Starring Michaela McManus, Stella Marcus, Jeremy Holm, Jim Cummings, Taylor Misiak, Dendrie Taylor, Derick Alexander, Raphael Chestang, Debra Christofferson, Minita Gandhi, London Garcia, Clinton Lowe, Michael Manuel, Remy Ortiz, Dan Perrault, Tamika Simpkins, Grace Van Dien, and Juan Francisco Villa.
SYNOPSIS:
Irene Kelly travels through parallel universes, repeatedly killing her daughter’s murderer. As she becomes consumed by vengeance, her humanity hangs in the balance.
The hook for Matthew and Kevin McManus’ sci-fi drama Redux Redux is so emotionally loaded that it could have sustained an entire narrative on its own. There is some hesitation in saying that it’s a mistake that the filmmakers introduce more characters and plot here, because even with a clunky middle section containing a couple of questionable detours, the destination confidently knows what it wants to do and say about this particular cycle of grief and revenge born from tragedy and a device allowing its user to jump across the multiverse.
Irene Kelly (Michaela McManus) is in possession of that device, lost in a fit of rage, moving from one timeline to the next, killing the murderer of her teenage daughter, hoping to find some catharsis in that vengeance. Of course, it would be healing if she found a timeline where her daughter Anna (Grace Van Dien) was still alive, but as we are treated to a montage of violent struggles and tussles with her and serial killer Neville (Jeremy Holm), it becomes clear that, more than anything, this has become a form of addiction; a dangerous coping mechanism that isn’t providing any therapy.
For reasons that won’t be divulged, Irene is forced to make herself a ghost across each of these timelines, only finding temporary solace and peace not by going into her grief group therapy meetings, but by using amassed knowledge from repetition to charm and seduce Jonathan (Jim Cummings) for a drink and more flirtation before he enters the building. This is her only relationship and source of comfort, both built on disingenuous yet well-meaning behavior, and it is further muddled when one considers that she is pushing him away from getting the help he needs. Neither of them is, making for yet another fascinating cycle explored here.
As mentioned, Irene’s character could have made for a richly satisfying low-fi character study without any diversions, but the film soon introduces teenager Mia (newcomer Stella Marcus) as a feisty orphan who has transferred from one abusive foster home to another, fated to have her own grisly encounter with Neville. Without going too far into detail, the two end up on the run together with Irene gradually explaining more about the situation (and, by extension, how this dimension-hopping machine works, which essentially resembles a cargo crate conveniently the length of a human being) and naturally coming to perceive her as a surrogate daughter to protect; one last chance per se to right some wrongs.
The good news is that all of this comes together and culminates in something emotionally satisfying. As Irene begins to pull away from her obsession with revenge, only for Mia to often let her rebellious temper get the best of her and insist that putting themselves in harm’s way and killing Neville over and over again is what they are destined to do. However, Redux Redux occasionally gets bogged down in sequences that follow Mia strictly or in subplots involving multiverse technology that don’t necessarily meaningfully expand on this modern, futuristic world. It’s never easy to shake that off; if the film had stuck to homing in on Irene’s emotional transformation through her cyclical revenge rather than treating it as entertainment for a prologue, it would have been a more viscerally effective character study. Fortunately, the film doesn’t fully get lost by tossing in more, but it takes some hopping around to recover and pull it all together.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Robert Kojder
