In this diverting thriller, a young woman discovers a kidnapping in progress while snowed in at a rest stop
In “No Exit,” the director Damien Power gets straight to business: Darby (Havana Rose Liu) is stuck in rehab and groaning her way through another group therapy session when she gets a call about her mother, who has suffered a brain aneurysm. Darby — edgy and impetuous — hot-wires a nurse’s car and zooms off toward the hospital where her mother is. Unfortunately, Darby is foiled by a massive snowstorm, which keeps her stranded at a remote rest stop with four strangers and no cellphone service.
Then, Darby discovers a little girl chained up in the back seat of someone’s van.
Adapted from a 2017 novel by Taylor Adams — the kind of fast-burning read you might find in an airport newsstand — “No Exit” mostly comes across as a diverting boilerplate thriller. Imagine a compressed, significantly downgraded, true-crime-adjacent version of “The Hateful Eight,” another snowy chamber drama that devolves into gunplay and brutal bloodshed.
Early on, the five marooned characters sit down to play B.S., a card game built around bluffing that clumsily mirrors Darby’s big question: Who among her new companions is responsible for the kidnapping?
Most seemingly trustworthy is an older couple: Sandi (Dale Dickey), who is a retired nurse, and Ed (Dennis Haysbert), a former Marine. Lars (David Rysdahl), a twitchy Gollum-esque weirdo, would seem to fit the bill, but there’s also Ash (Danny Ramirez), a dashing jock, to consider.
“No Exit” drops an arsenal of twists and rug-pulls at a machine gun’s pace, though Power, the director, doesn’t quite know how to milk the tension, and the perfunctory script (written by Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari) tries and fails to give the events a greater resonance. For her part, Liu makes an unusually complex final girl when she’s the only one left standing in a closing act showdown that makes crafty use of Darby’s drug addiction. And at least Power knows how to end things — that is, in ridiculous, flame-swept fashion.
No Exit
Rated R for bloody violence, drugs, kidnapping, strong language and forced intimacy. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. Watch on Hulu.
Source: Movies - nytimes.com
