Lowell Dean is really knocking it out of the park with two releases this year. His latest, Die Alone, concerns how to go on with life when that soulmate goes missing. In what Dark Match (movie review) offered was a look at trust amongst teammates in a literal fight against one another to the death in order to summon a demon. Both movies play on what’s most important, relationships, and add in the terror later.
Ultimately, it’s more of a survival drama seen through Ethan (Douglas Smith)’s eyes. He doesn’t know what’s going on because, during part of the narrative, he’s questioning why he can’t leave the farm. As a person who has moments of memory loss, that can be dangerous. He wants to be reunited with his wife, Emma (Kimberly-Sue Murray), but Mae (Carrie-Anne Moss) is keeping him close, and he’s not comfortable with that.
Whenever he “resets,” she has to get him up to speed. However, there are clues which make their relationship rather unsettling. The movie is titled as such because both individuals experienced loss and they need someone in their lives to keep going. With no one special to be with, life isn’t worth living. But the clues are there for the eagle eyed. The reveal isn’t all that surprising, and what really works is in how these two find “love.”
As the backstory unfolds, we learn how the world fell. The flashbacks tell audiences how a very deadly biological virus is spreading across the Earth, and nobody knows how to stop it! Much like COVID-19, it spreads through contact. Fortunately, physical contact is required and this plant-like infection is turning people into monsters akin to zombies. Those who can move around are called The Reclaimed.
Ethan believes Mother Nature is finally fighting back after these centuries of urbanization. She’s tired of it, and is reshaping the world by turning everyone to some plant-like organism. As for those who managed to evade the walking dead, only time will tell if the grunts will find them and infect! Those people that have become one with nature are absolutely beautiful to behold as they are simply skeletons with foilage overgrowth.
Some sentience is retained whilst their skeletons dot the landscape like trees. I rather love these moments; the attention to designing these markers are akin to Halloween decorations. The impeccable set design really shows how new decay has set in, and as for how well the rural world has fared, the more pastoral it is the better!
As for those walking dead able to roam about to feast, they’re far more dangerous! No place is honestly safe. And this movie, Die Alone, may well be the best film to catapult Dean to the mainstream.
5 Stars out of 5
Die Alone Movie Trailer
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