NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE

UK, 2021, 85 minutes, Colour.

Christina Rodlo, Marc Menchaca, David Figlioli, David Barrera.

Directed by Santiago Menghini.

This is a haunted house thriller, filmed in Cleveland, Ohio, but a British production (including Andy Serkis as producer).

There are two major plot lines working through the film: illegals coming from Central America, working in sewing factories, having difficulties with identity cards, being exploited, and, on the other hand, an eerie house, ghosts, mysterious rituals, some torture, visual monsters. At times one tends to distract from the other and vice versa.

The opening sets the haunted house theme, some footage of excavations in Mexico in 1963, the leader finding a mysterious box and bringing it back to the US. And there is a prologue of a woman suddenly disappearing. Then there is the transition to the illegals, a focus on Ambar, getting work in a factory, finding accommodation, lending money to an alleged friend for an identity card and the friend absconding, her becoming more and more desperate, relying on relatives.

But, there are a few things about the house, managed by a middle-aged man, Red (Marc Menchaca), ambiguous in his reactions to Ambar. It turns out he is loyal to his older brother, Becker (David Figlioli) who is psychopathic, murderous, and a gradual revelation that these are the two sons of the explorer who murdered him, holding the box in the basement, an area for some ritual sacrifices and the emergence of a monster.

Other characters, women in the building, Ambar’s relative coming to save her and being bashed, her eventual capture, the recurrence of her dreams in which people appear and disappear, her suddenly waking at home, in a diner. And the continued memory of her self-sacrifice in helping her mother during her final illness. This seems important in the finale when she resents her mother and attempts to kill her in her imagination.

Blood and mayhem – and an ambiguous ending which audiences can interpret as they wish.

1. The title? Ominous? The house, the two brothers, the women guests, illegals, trapped?
2. The Cleveland settings, the uglier side is of the city, streets, trains, garment factories, diners, and the relatives comfortable house? Ominous musical score?
3. The prologue, Arthur Wellesley, the footage, Mexico 1963, the discoveries, the moths and butterflies, the box? The revelation that the two men were his sons, that they had killed him, the death of their mother? Red protecting his older brother, complete loyalty? The older brother, psychopathic, the women, the rituals, torture?
4. Ambar, the background of her sick mother, not going to college, entering Ohio illegally, her age, experience, the job in the factory, the manager and his demands, the need for identity papers, her friend, her giving her the money, the friend absconding? The apartment, Red, wanting her deposit back? His behaviour, the eerie presence of other women, ghostly? Ambar and her exploring the room, the information about Arthur Wellesley, the box?
5. Ambar escaping after the ghostly expert experiences, her nightmares, continuous, real people, imaginary people, sudden waking, in the diner, on the train? Her wandering, Red finding her, her returning to the house?
6. The visit to her relations, consideration, the gift of the coat, the phone call, the truth about her identity card, Beto coming to help her, the attack, his freeing her in the basement, his death?
7. The other women, ethnic backgrounds, their work, appearing and disappearing?
8. The combination, Ambar and her being tied up, to the basement, the rituals, candles, the appearance of the monster, devouring, and the remembering her mother, fighting her mother, some kind of catharsis?
9. The attack on Red, Becker and his going to the basement, devoured by the monster?
10. The ending – open-ended?

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