Jay Rohr
Rounding is close to a perfect psychological thriller. It lures the audience in with a compelling concept turned into concrete by a solid performance courtesy of Namir Smallwood. Viewers will be guessing what’s true until the very end. Unfortunately, that’s when problems arise.
The story centers on James Hayman played by Namir Smallwood (American Rust). After complicated events result in a patient’s demise, this medical student on the verge of being a doctor is reassigned to a remote rural hospital. There he tries to settle into the isolated locale as well as work, but troubling visions plague the young medical practitioner. Feeling increasingly unhinged, James soon obsesses over a patient whose health problems may be signs of something sinister. Combating his own visceral nervous breakdown is only part of the nightmare which then lies ahead.
Director Alex Thompson also penned the script with help from Christopher Thompson. As such, the two have put together a nail biter that only flinches towards the end. Where exactly events are leading is open to interpretation until the conclusion. The suspicions driving James may be accurate, delusions, or perhaps he’s unaware of his own contribution to the sinister situation. Audiences are only ever given enough to guess, while smart writing spills slight details which illuminate puzzle pieces, never the whole plot portrait.
Unfortunately, the narrative cleverness seems to have spent all the quality ideas on plot. There’s very little left for characters. Even James, despite being the lead, never feels fully fleshed out. Namir Smallwood’s performance gives the character more personality than is clearly in the script since nothing in the film really evokes any facets. Outside of being a stressed doctor doing doctor things, the character is kind of flat.
While every performance is decent, Rounding is plagued by similarly shallow characterizations. Michael Potts as Dr. Emil Harrison provides more gravity through his performance than the dialogue does. Sideny Flanigan as Helen Adso, the sick patient at the center of James’s attention, is fine. However, she’s not so much a person as a plot device, an issue reducing the dimensions of every role in Rounding. Many characters only seem to exist to give James occasional interactions which fuel his next psychological turmoil.
Where this thriller excels is the building of tension. Wonderful combinations of cinematography alongside phantasmagoric moments make Rounding captivatingly surreal. It’s easy to feel inside the madness afflicting James, especially when unreal events unfold. Glimpses of medieval manuscript pages around the hospital such as what seems the seven-headed demon in Liber Floridus by Lambert de Saint-Omer create supernatural implications. As James is afflicted by visions of creatures similar to the hideous things on pages he’s found, it lends weight to the uncertainty of what’s occurring. Rounding never lets the audience know if it’s plain insanity, occult occurrences, or supernatural suffering.
The look of the film helps with this a great deal. Rounding solidly employs horror conventions when it comes to cinematography. Some could argue the flick is generic in its visual tone but that doesn’t make it any less effective. Writer-director Alex Thompson follows a paint-by-numbers visual presentation that is effectively creepy — generic is not always a failing in genre. The intentional imagery of empty, wintery rural roads or sodium orange saturated halls is effective, albeit nothing new.
There’s a gothic quality to the story. The main theme seems to be dealing with regret and how that can warp a person. In that respect, Rounding does well. But its slow pace gives the impression of several lost opportunities to flesh out at least its lead.
The few flaws there are to the film can’t be attributed to Smallwood. His acting anchors this psychological thriller while signaling a promising future as a performer. The rest of the cast do well enough to wish they’d been given more to do.
Instead, Rounding focuses on surreal phantasmagoria alongside occasionally cringe inducing wounds while fleshing out a gothic tale of regret spiraling into insanity. If only it all came together better in the end. Rounding is a wonderful psychological thriller that may be all too easily missed. Its strength is the main performance by Namir Smallwood, but a potent weakness undermines the effort. This is a horror story without consequences which robs the film of teeth. There’s no bite to the outcome, rather an ah shucks nihilistic take on life. Everything compelling is washed away in a twist rendering much of the movie meaningless.
Although Rounding can be an interesting ride it arrives nowhere interesting. The best parts become gilding of a mundane story that feels like a waste of time. That’s a shame since it sacrifices a phenomenal performance by Namir Smallwood. And there is real tension to this molasses slow burn. It just never pays off in any deeply satisfying ways. Consequently, Rounding is best as a warmup on an evening in search of something fresh, the imperfect appetizer that makes the main meal all the more satiating.
It’s tempting to say this is the kind of movie that ends up on a watch list for six months before viewers finally get around to it. Any audience isn’t going to be terribly disappointed. Yet, Rounding can only whet the appetite for something better. At best, it’s a psychological thriller you haven’t seen before, and fresh is always better than stale. Though it veers close to greatness, Rounding is a captivating gothic tale of madness with a bad ending. The whole film isn’t ruined by that, it just leaves one wondering what could have been.
