J Paul Johnson
Human Resources, a workplace-horror set piece from first-time feature co-writer and director Braden Swope, has a lot going for it: a clever conceit, a winning central performance, and a setting that will surely resonate with almost anyone who’s ever worked a demeaning, dehumanizing entry-level job in retail.
In other words, with nearly all of us.
Swope’s film is set primarily in a nondescript Brooke’s Hardware store (its signage more than a little reminiscent of a recognizable chain), where Sam Coleman (Hugh McCrae, Jr.) finds himself offered a full-time job ahead of the seasonal rush. A long slog of rejected applications has him skittish about his chances, but he needs the gig badly if he is to finance his distant medical-school dreams. What he doesn’t know is the reason why, exactly, the store so desperately needs an immediate replacement for their most recently terminated former employee.
And by terminated, I mean terminated.
In fact, the store’s single human resources officer (Anthony Candell) and manager (Tim Mizurazde) seem not only especially desperate to install Sam as the new replacement but weirdly anxious to do so. It doesn’t take a genius to realize something terrifying lurks just behind the walls. With the reluctant help of sympathetic fellow employee Sarah (Sarah José), Sam finds himself not only coping with the pressures of a new job but deeply enmeshed in a mystery that exploits the very nature of “human resources.”
Sam and his fellow employees, it seems, do more than just clock in and serve time: they serve as the very “human resources” on which the capitalist system feeds, in this case in manners that turn out to be as horrifying as well, say, the horror classic Night of the Living Dead, which, without giving away too much of Human Resources‘ surprise developments, the narrative begins to emulate, including the single well-intentioned and highly capable Black man as the last bulwark against a ravenous horde desperate to claim his flesh.
Night of the Living Dead, then, is one of the film’s influences, and even though Human Resources never really addresses race explicitly, so are the more comic, but no less frightening sensibilities of Get Out and Sorry to Bother You. These are films that illustrate the necessary learned competence of Black men who, it turns out, have reason to be wary of the evils that lurk about them. Human Resources‘ protagonist Sam may seem on the surface unnecessarily skittish, but centuries of racial injustice and decades of horror-film narratives have charted the dangers that might lurk behind the endcaps and beneath the storage racks, even at your local hardware store.
If Human Resources channels classics like those in its themes and tropes, it’s a ways away from equaling any of them in its technique. Swope’s script unfurls awfully slowly for a relatively simple narrative with no subplots, flashbacks, or tangents. Even some minor characterization notes unfold awkwardly: for us to understand Sam is on a losing streak in his job search, he has run his rejection notes through an inkjet printer, collected them in a manila file folder, and carried them to his car where he spends more than a few minutes forlornly perusing them.
While the performances—especially McCrae’s—are all competent and the conceit engaging, the film’s uneven pacing works against it, especially since the setting itself (most of it taking place inside the store) is by default visually uninteresting. A fatigue of dull green fluorescence can’t help but set in. When finally Sam uncovers the truths behind the cover-up, the film’s obvious budget restraints are even more pronounced: the shadowy figures that terrorize Sam simply can’t quite horrify viewers given their obviously limited production resources. They’re just extras in masks.
Those aren’t intended as damning criticisms, however, just mere observations. The sound design, musical score, art, and production design all work well, especially given the crew’s youth: some are still working at their degrees and Swope himself, tackling this IndieGoGo-funded project just out of school, is a director of considerable promise. While a more seasoned director might have found ways to make Human Resources’ script more efficient or its visuals more compelling, Swope and his crew have done a lot with little, bringing the film to its fruition for a successful festival run in 2021 and its upcoming streaming services release.
And for those of you who’ve ever wondered what happened to all the former employees of those entry-level dead-end retail gigs you’ve suffered through yourself, Human Resources’ venture into the unknown has one possible answer for you: they’ve fed the system, and not just economically. They are human resources, indeed.
DeskPop Entertainment’s mystery/horror film Human Resources is available On Demand January 10, 2023.
