Cold in July (2014)

Directed by Jim Mickle; produced by Rene Bastian, Adam Folk, Linda Moran and Marie Savare

Richard Dane (Michael C Hall) has a good life with a loving wife, a growing son and decent job. This life is turned upside down when he shoots and kills a burglar. That horrendous but simple event becomes complicated after the police tell him that the burglar’s father, Ben Russel (Sam Shepard), has arrived in town. And yet, despite Russel being a career criminal, just out of prison, and implying a sinister fate for Richard, the young family man finds that this new twist to his once orderly existence may not be the biggest threat he’s facing.

An inventive entry in the ‘neo-noir’ genre, Cold in July could, with updates to content taken into account, easily fit into the original film noir category. One of the interesting aspects about the movie is how it changes its presentation: what seemingly is a straightforward story of a vengeful parent threatening a family becomes something else, and then, later, something else again. This might be a detriment with another script, but Cold in July moves seamlessly from one element to another, and continues to make sense doing it.

Hall does very well as an ordinary man – for once in a movie, he is not only already married but happily so – who owns a revolver but is so remorseful about using it that he feels he must attend his victim’s pathetic funeral. Shepard is a natural as the tough convict who has a surprising sense of justice. Don Johnson has fun playing the part of Shepard’s long-time friend, a private investigator / pig-farmer. Nick Damici, who co-wrote the screenplay with the director, plays the police detective in charge of the case. All are assets to the picture.

The writing is good, despite a few lapses (such as how Ben identifies the son he hasn’t seen in twenty years), but nothing that ruins the story. An entertaining feature is how it keeps the viewer guessing as to what will happen next, until the climax, which is both violent and exciting.

Mickle has most often directed and written in the horror genre. I can’t comment on any of those works but he manages crime and film-noir handily. There are bloody scenes but nothing exaggerated, and most of the tension comes from the relationships among the leading characters, and how they are depicted. At one hour and forty-nine minutes, little is added that shouldn’t have been, and the time is filled with what needs to be included.

Cold in July is an entertaining and satisfying crime-drama, one that those who enjoy such movies from the 1940s and ‘50s would like.