ALPHA ALERT (2013)

Studio:       Lionsgate
Director:    Matthew Thompson
Writer:       Scott Bolger, Kent Murray, Matthew Thompson
Producer:  Christine Alderson, Thomas Sterchi, Lars Wiebe
Stars:     Jennifer Morrison, Josh Stewart, James Frain, Kimberly Elise, Stephen Rider, Jude Ciccolella

Review Score:

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Summary:

Three soldiers suffering from PTSD find themselves trapped in an elevator after a terrorist’s bomb disables their building.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

At Lambro, a U.S. Army medical facility located one mile west of Washington D.C., Dr. Andrews counsels Captain C. White, PFC R. Diego, and Sergeant Bradley Oldsman for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Their treatment includes an experimental drug called Transitol. After their separate sessions conclude, all three soldiers find themselves riding the same elevator.

The elevator stalls and shakes to an emergency stop. White and Diego realize that their phones cannot make calls and that Oldsman’s radio no longer has a signal. A woman identifying herself as Lt. Blau finally contacts the soldiers over the elevator’s emergency call box, but she avoids providing any details about what is happening outside.

Tensions rise between Oldsman and White as the situation continues. White is eventually able to use her phone to send texts and to check the Internet. She learns of a terrorist attack on Washington D.C. using a dirty bomb that threatens to send a radioactive cloud in their direction. White frantically texts with her mother to find White’s daughter Lauren, who has gone missing in the confusion.

Blau claims to be unable to locate the maintenance team who can rescue them from the elevator. With the building being evacuated due to the radiation threat, Blau orders White and the others to stay put until a rescue team can come for them in 48 hours. After White and Diego plead for another way out, Blau tells them about a “Safe Low Descent” button located on top of the elevator. Blau tells them they have ten minutes before the cloud reaches the building and then she signs off.

A physical fight ensues when White and Diego try going through the maintenance hatch to reach the button while Oldsman insists on waiting for the rescue team as ordered. White eventually makes it to the button, but the elevator stalls once again. A cloud soon descends through the elevator shaft and into the car. It is then revealed that the three soldiers are actually unknowing participants in a 14-stage simulation conducted by Dr. Andrews and monitored by Lt. Blau to test the effects of Transitol.

Blaming White for opening the hatch, Oldsman attacks her. Aware of the escalating violence, Andrews and Blau try to abort the experiment but are unable to override the program. The three soldiers struggle and Oldsman eventually stabs Diego to death. White retreats back to the top of the elevator car to separate herself from Oldsman.

Blau recommends shutting down the test. However, realizing that White is performing above expectations given the circumstances, Andrews considers the medical testing benefits of continuing with the experiment. General Black intervenes. Needing the drug to be a success in order to treat PTSD-afflicted soldiers en masse, Black dismisses Blau and orders Andrews to continue.

The faceoff between White and Oldsman continues until White begins ascending the elevator shaft by pulling herself up on the cables. Along her way, White discovers gas canisters and speakers mounted in the walls. Meanwhile, Oldsman discovers cameras hidden in the elevator, but presumes White was part of a secret plan to monitor him.

Gen. Black orders Dr. Andrews to initiate a fifteenth event for the test that will crash the elevator car and kill the participants to cover up the trial. Andrews reluctantly activates the sequence. The car crashes and kills Oldsman, but White makes it to the top of the shaft and escapes through the doors to the top floor.

White collects incriminating records of the Transitol experiment from Andrews’ office and flees the building. She then sends a video recording to Gen. Black informing him of her plan to expose the operation publicly in order to honor the deaths of Oldsman and Diego.

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Review:

Three young soldiers suffering from PTSD leave their separate sessions at a military psychiatrist’s office and end up riding the same elevator together.  Suddenly, something rocks the building and their elevator car screeches to a halt.  It takes some time before a lieutenant on the other end of an emergency call box finally responds to the distress, but she is suspiciously unforthcoming about exactly what is happening.  Courtesy of a cell phone news story, the trio soon learns why.  Terrorists have detonated a dirty bomb in Washington, D.C., sending a radioactive cloud in their direction.  And there is seemingly nothing the trapped soldiers can do to escape before it hits.

“Alpha Alert” starts as a paranoia thriller, and it is this first act that is most effective.  Opening scenes brim with mind-scrabbling tension stemming from feelings of helplessness, confusion, and panic.  These are emotions that can wind up an audience to invest in the intrigue and to become excited about the suspense.

Then “Alpha Alert” introduces a pseudo-twist that should be a spoiler to divulge, but apparently isn’t since the movie’s own cover art identifies it as “a top military experiment gone wrong.”  Couple that with the above summary and you can piece together what the true plot really is.

It is a puzzling mistake that the film does not make an effort to disguise its secret, because that reveal is the story’s big midpoint payoff.  Once that cat is out of the bag, the entire pressure-fueled atmosphere dissipates right along with it.  Its wake leaves only a predictable action-oriented denouement that is less satisfying than the initial mystery, and creates a too safe environment from the knowledge that the main characters are in semi-controlled conditions after all.

The tightrope walk facing claustrophobic thrillers is that they have less wiggle room than their confined characters.  With just three people inside a 10’x10’ room for 90 minutes, there are no external fallbacks for a tempo change if the story should worm its way into a corner.  Such tight focus has to sustain audience fascination exclusively on its own and anything less than perfect execution will equate to mediocre results.

“Alpha Alert” does find momentary distractions in the form of therapy session flashbacks that unintentionally prick the taut tension balloon with a nail instead of providing any truly meaty character origins.  Introductions already sufficiently root the main players in the stereotypes necessary for the story’s character dynamic to work: capable yet emotionally broken female, misogynistic military man, and “can’t we all just get along” good guy to come between the first two as needed.  The flashbacks are gravy on a meal already digested and function mainly as brick walls for the momentum.

With the mystery uncovered, the film’s edges begin visibly fraying before subsequently unraveling rapidly.  “Alpha Alert” devolves into a routine tsk tsk tale of corrupt government officials tossing ethics to the wind with a covert experiment of dubious design.  With that formulaic filler to finish out the film comes a handful of plot devices too contrived to overlook.

The military’s motives for their test may be suspect, but their methods are wildly impressive.  Through technology unknown, the Army doctors can somehow monitor heart rates and vital signs despite no one being hooked into a wire, follow one soldier’s ascent up an elevator shaft at eye level without there actually being a track camera mounted in the wall, and lower an elevator car along one cable without affecting the other cables at all.

Partially salvaging the movie is a quality cast of capable familiar faces, all of whom elevate the material through sheer force of their performances.  Lead actress Jennifer Morrison is particularly noteworthy playing a competently tough female officer without sacrificing any attractive femininity.  It is a role that is made stronger by casting a woman without having to unnecessarily tout her gender as a defining characteristic.

The cast keeps “Alpha Alert” clipping, but there isn’t enough creativity story-wise down the back slope to carry the premise developed during the exposition climb.  By its end, “Alpha Alert” settles into a groove as an average thriller with a few minor highlights, yet no compelling reason to ever watch or mention it again, if it is even worth seeking out the first time.

NOTE: “Alpha Alert” is also known by the alternate titles “Event 15” and “Trauma.”

Review Score:  50

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