Cargo (2017) Dir: Yolanda Ramke & Ben Howling

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I've been thinking about watching this Netflix original survival thriller pretty much constantly since I first saw it on Netflix a few years ago. I don't know why, I think the description just intrigued me. The problem was, there was always a film or two in front of it in the pecking order. Finally, however, I decided to get this Yolanda Ramke and Ben Howling directed film watched.

The film takes place, and was filmed, amongst the baked earth and crisp heat of South Australia, which certainly made it an appropriate setting for a post-apocalyptic thriller. The scenes that took place around the river looked interesting, but, beyond those, everything looked very samey and very generic. It didn't look bad, per-se, but it wasn't exactly an interesting film visually.

The film features a lot of indigenous side characters, and there seemed to be an attempt to give some greater meaning to their involvement, but, unfortunately, it didn't really have an impact. A lot of it came across as shallow, or muddled. There was something of a meaningful idea there, but whatever it was, the execution was not good enough.

The narrative was very generic, for the most part. The zombie 'USP' being crusty eyes just wasn't unique enough to be interesting. I felt like I'd seen the vast majority of the film many times before. It didn't help matters that just about every character in the film felt either generic or too shallow either. Ultimately, I failed to find any significant substance in this.

Martin Freeman, unfortunately, has a habit of only playing Martin Freeman, which is fine when the character really suits it, but kind of irritating when the character feels like they should really behave like anyone but Freeman. I was really hoping that Freeman would provide something a little different in this performance, but there was literally nothing new. This was not his best showing, by any means.

I really wanted to like the performance of the young Simone Landers, but, unfortunately, I just didn't think she was very good. It was just abundantly clear that she was acting. She was clearly trying, which I most assuredly appreciated, but I don't believe she was able to achieve the levels required for the character.

There were a few others worth talking about, from the supporting cast. Anthony Hayes provided an antagonist of sorts, but both the writing of his character and his actual acting was poor. The pair of Susie Porter and Caren Pistorius were solid performers in their respective roles, but I wish they'd had slightly bigger roles.

Overall, it probably didn't help my feelings towards this film that I had been thinking about it for quite a while before watching it, but, regardless, I was left pretty disappointed by this film. The story was very basic, the characters were dull, and the acting was unconvincing. Of the various post-apocalyptic films I've seen, this was nowhere near the upper echelon of that list.