Since the dawn of cinema, the Western has conjured up an abundance of memorable, grizzled outlaws, often out to rob a bank or a train in a brazen attempt to make off with the loot, all before being summarily dispatched by the righteous hero, who is often a Sheriff or other figure of law enforcement. The Isolate Thief borrows plenty of familiar genre beats and iconography, only to then have them subverted by Kevin Lefler’s screenplay. The director of the film is John Suits, a filmmaker nominally associated with DTV actioners; think less the crackling, resourceful kind of William Kaufman, and more of the dismal kind that starred Bruce Willis in his final years as a performer before being forced him into retirement. It’s a pleasant surprise then that The Isolate Thief indicates a step toward maturity for Suits, who crafts a slow burn affair starring an unlikely protagonist and set against harsh, remote conditions. The film ultimately can’t entirely sustain its already relatively short runtime, but for a good while The Isolate Thief offers plenty of fine-tuned moments of suspense and enough of a twist on the Western to suggest that Suits could be a director to watch.
Set in January 1865, in the High Cascades of Oregon, the Civil War is in its waning months, but all is quiet at the Union Army outpost run by Ada (Mackenzie Foy). Having lost her military father some four weeks prior, Ada is truly all alone, maintaining order with what little livestock she has left and fending off the occasional wolf that encircles her outpost’s perimeter. With dreams of fleeing to San Francisco, Ada’s quiet world is disrupted by the sudden appearance of Perry (Joe Pantoliano), a frazzled thief who breaks in looking for supplies. Allowing the intruder to leave, Ada tracks down Perry’s camp, coming upon several buried bags of gold out in the wilderness. Taking the bounty for herself, Ada hastily returns to her outpost, but trouble arrives in the form of John Good (Sean Bean) and his gang of Union soldiers, who have captured Perry and tend to brutal, unfinished business with him and their missing treasure. Stashing the gold on her premises, Ada soon finds herself in over her head as John and his men commandeer the outpost, forcing the girl to tiptoe around these wolves like a lone, terrified lamb. Also caught in the mix is Emily (Odeya Rush), a sex worker picked up by John’s men who eventually forms an unspoken pact with Ada, the pair finding common ground in their desperate bids for survival as they endeavor to make it out of the outpost alive.
True to its title, The Isolate Thief immediately underlines the loneliness of its setting, with cinematographer Will Stone capturing all the frigid details of the mountains in a cool, blue-tinged palette, enveloping the proceedings within a chilly, ominous atmosphere. At first, there’s just Ada and her handful of pigs in these environs, but it’s established quickly that this young woman is not completely helpless — she tends to her wounds that are the result of a malfunctioning rifle with basic nursing and medical training. Nonetheless, this is a life she’s eager to leave behind, but the encounter with Perry throws a wrench into the works, and soon the arrival of John makes her escape all but impossible, introducing violence into Ada’s world as Perry is lynched in order to reveal the whereabouts of the Union solders’ gold. Suits does a fine job of doling out ample tension in the early goings, keeping this cat-and-mouse thriller plenty suspenseful while Ada does her best to evade suspicion from John and his men. There’s a sparse, minimalist emphasis on observing these characters moving in proximity to each other, relying less on shoot-’em-up histrionics or recycled Western narrative beats than the choreographed dance they are playing out. To this end, performances help to sell the film, with Foy proving an appealing lead and Bean predictably well-suited to step into the shoes of the Big Bad here, bringing a quietly understated menace to his part. And bonus points for Pantoliano, who may not clock much screentime, but who does juice the film with memorable, jittery energy in his brief appearance.
But once the board is set and all revelations are made, The Isolate Thief slips into something unfortunately more routine, and with this pivot comes much of the film’s air being let out. Simply put, there’s just nowhere else for the film to go, as the unease mustered through intimidation and threat-making gives way to a rote shootout that is none too thrilling and carries on for far too long. It’s a disappointing wind-down for a film with such a promising, atypical opening stretch, and even goes to far as betraying the realism that Suits and co. had tried so hard to establish by doubling down emphasizing bodies perforated by bullets moving about without much concern or limitation. Nonetheless, Suits shows considerable improvement here on his previous work, and perhaps with another pass or two at a screenplay his next film could be truly memorable.
DIRECTOR: John Suits; CAST: Mackenzie Foy, Odeya Rush, Sean Bean, Joe Pantoliano; DISTRIBUTOR: Radial Entertainment; IN THEATERS: July 10; RUNTIME: 1 hr. 35 min.
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