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Amber Alert movie review and movie summary (2024)

Amber Alert movie review and movie summary (2024)

Vaseline 1 month ago

In 2012, a ‘found footage’ film called ‘Amber Alert’ was released. It had a pretty cool premise, but a fairly sloppy presentation (which is common with Found Footage projects). A group of children hear an Amber Alert and see the car on the highway. They give chase, which leads to all kinds of unlikely twists and nonsensical behavior, all ‘captured’ by the cell phone cameras. The main thing I remember about “Amber Alert” is how everyone was screaming the whole time. The characters bickered from start to finish and it felt chaotic and unformed. Now here we are, in 2024, with a new movie with the same title and screenplay. It’s essentially the same film, although the recent film ditches the Found Footage approach. Kerry Bellessa directed both films. As Yogi Berra once said, “It’s deja vu all over again.”

Returning to remake a film you initially shot twelve years ago is an interesting idea. But has anything improved? There are so many stories in the world. Why tell this twice? The 2012 film was clearly shot on a micro-budget, and the Found Footage aspect brought with it all the typical problems of the ‘genre’. The 2024 version is sleeker and more polished, the acting is much better, and in a way it’s easier to watch, even with the absurd final sequence. The installation is a bit complicated, but it goes like this:

An 8-year-old girl named Charlotte disappears from the park while playing hide and seek with her brother. The mother panics. She was taking videos of her baby and gets a glimpse of her daughter standing next to a black car in the background. She immediately calls the police. Meanwhile, a young woman named Jaq (Hayden Panettiere) hails an off-duty ride. She arrives late and is desperate. The driver, Shane (Tyler James Williams), has to go home for his son’s birthday, but agrees to take her along since he is on his way. They both get the Amber Alert on their phones and a few minutes later they think they see the car. They call the police and then chase the car wherever it goes.

It’s a gripping set-up, and Panettiere and Williams create believable chemistry through casual conversations. Shane doesn’t want to get involved in the Amber Alert car chase, but is convinced by Jaq’s passion and urgency. The police are overwhelmed by the tips coming in (including those from Jaq and Shane) and end up supporting the two sleuths, essentially doing their job for them.

Saidah Arrika Ekulona makes a huge impression as the dispatcher who answers the first call. She convinces the sergeant (Kevin Dunn) that they should issue an Amber Alert, even though they have no license plate and the car is a Camry (needle in a haystack). Once Jaq and Shane’s journey takes over, Ekulona largely disappears from the film and the film misses her perspective. There are quite a few good “dispatcher” films (with 2018’s “The Guilty,” directed by Gustav Möller, the clear winner). Ekulona is usually alone on her phone, and her urgency and competence dominate the screen. The coordinator lives in the real world. Jaq and Shane are clearly in a movie. They both have backstories, which presumably makes them even more empathetic to the plight of the missing girl. All this is unnecessary and drags down “Amber Alert”. We don’t need to hear about Jaq’s past to “understand” why she cares about the missing girl.

The film has a driving rhythm and cinematographer Luka Bazeli occasionally uses drone shots to emphasize the smallness of the car and the impossibility of the search. (Drone shots can be effective, but sometimes I miss old-fashioned helicopter shots, which add reality and humanity to the action on screen. ‘Dog Day Afternoon’ with drone shots instead of hovering helicopters wouldn’t be the same movie.)

“Amber Alert” is ostensibly about the amber alert system (a few title cards appear at the end detailing the history of the system and how many children it has saved). The film cannot stop itself from becoming an episode of “Criminal Minds” in the final scene. Jaq and Shane take crazy risks and their behavior is often incomprehensible. The overall feeling is not one of real danger, but an obligatory ticking of the ‘thriller’ boxes. Once the final showdown begins, it’s strictly from the playbook. ‘Amber Alert’ sometimes works as a thriller, but it has serious ambitions. It wants to ‘say’ something. These two things don’t go together.