Noise - DVD Review

NOISE (**) - Starring Tim Robbins, Bridget Moynahan, William Hurt, William Baldwin, Margarita Levieva and Gabrielle Brennan.
Writte & directed by Henry Bean.

This is a 30-minute idea stretched to 90 minutes. I liked the set-up, and I felt for the character. Tim Robbins is a guy being driven crazy by excess noise, especially the invasive sound of car alarms. He eventually becomes a vigilante known as the Rectifier, who vandalizes cars that have their alarms go off. He's also so angry anyway that car alarms feel like an excuse for him to go nuts.

I liked the first 15 minutes, and I liked the last 15 minutes, and the movie takes a couple walks around the park in the middle. I feel like more and more indies I've been seeing have been doing that, like they're all based on short story ideas, but they stretch it out to feature length. If they stay short, they know the only way they'll get seen is if they're nominated for Best Live-Action Short and then air on IFC or Sundance Channel. Full-length at least gives them hope of some DVD rentals.

But this movie makes a good case for the pointlessness of car alarms.