The Trigger Effect

David Koepp’s directorial debut, The Trigger Effect follows married couple Matthew (Kyle MacLachlan) and Annie (Elisabeth Shue) as they and a friend (Dermot Mulroney’s Joe) are forced to fend for themselves after a seemingly nationwide power outage. Writer/director Koepp does a fantastic job of immediately capturing the viewer’s interest and attention, as The Trigger Effect opens with a visually-impressive single-take shot that’s heightened by an engrossing, movie-theater-set confrontation – with the movie, past that point, segueing into a comparatively subdued yet sporadically engrossing midsection. Koepp spends the bulk of the picture’s brisk running time exploring the breakdown of society and the impact it has on his three well-defined protagonists, and though the filmmaker occasionally does rely a little too heavily on coincidence and contrivance, The Trigger Effect nevertheless progresses through a well-paced narrative that’s been punctuated with a whole host of compelling sequences. (There is, for example, a completely engrossing interlude in which the three heroes encounter a suspicious man in need of a ride.) It’s clear, as well, that Koepp does a superb job of slowly ratcheting up the tension throughout, which ensures that the movie contains very few lulls and certainly builds to a fairly engrossing climactic stretch – with the end result a solid first effort from a seriously promising new filmmaker.

*** out of ****