Last Straw

It’s encouraging to see low-budget early-career film-making with ambition.

Last Straw is as much about the journey as it is the destination, and there’s a genuine feeling of delight as protagonist Nancy’s night from hell takes us to places its otherwise seemingly generic set-up might not prepare us for.

The siege horror is effective, and Neal’s assured grasp on the tricky narrative framing makes for an engaging debut.

Neal's understanding of genre delightfully plays out on screen, allowing the audience to go along for the ride.

It's set entirely in a diner, which I love, and Jessica Belkin is a character you might be annoyed by at first, but give her a chance. She has a nice arc. This is what The Strangers Chapter 1 should have been due to the killers having a similar appeal.

Hits what viewers want in a slasher movie.

What begins with pranks, each one more brazen than the last, escalates to a point of no return in which violence takes over the stage. [Full review in Spanish]

Despite clear signs of brilliance simmering down the surface, you get a distant, often flat-out uninteresting genre exercise that doesn’t know what to do with its gore-filled premise.

"Last Straw" is a tense and taught, well-crafted thriller that subverts expectations and challenges your perspective in intriguing ways. It’s gorgeously shot with a striking minimalist score that wrings out every last drop of glorious tension.

For a feature debut, Alan Scott Neal demonstrates remarkable skill in crafting a film that is both thrilling and emotionally resonant.