Dramatic Filler Buries Silo‘s Agricultural Survival Story
“The kid is surrounded by unstable corn!” isn’t exactly the most intimidating phrase ever shouted by a desperate survival film’s character, but Silo keeps a straight face as it convincingly explains the dangers of grain entrapment. Yet, the danger is about all that’s convincing about it and, at just over an hour and stuffed with fluff, Silo feels like a PSA run amok—its central farming threat dragged down to the corny depths by its dramatic surroundings.
The root of the problem is that first-time feature director Marshall Burnette expanded his 11-minute 2017 short film Silo: Edge of the Real World into this, and I’m sure that it’s a far more intense and compelling experience at 11 minutes. Tacking on an additional hour of lightly sketched character work and panicky, silly tropes (stubborn authority figures refusing to listen to the people that know what’s going on; necessary information getting lost in a character’s insistent stammering) are telltale signs of a filmmaker in over his head.
But the premise still packs a decent punch. After an accident working on a farm run by Junior (Jim Parrack), the asthmatic Kodiak (Jack DiFalco) is stuck chest-deep in corn—the weight crushing his body while simultaneously threatening to engulf and ultimately suffocate him. A bad break to be sure, especially if you need an inhaler. It’s a terrifying scenario that sounds as uncinematic as 127 Hours’ premise of “Arm? Stuck Bad,” but one which Burnette and his cast manage to make sporadically entertaining. DiFalco is a worthy victim and even his palpable desperation is outshined by his friend Lucha (Danny Ramirez), whom Ramirez invests with a truly complex mix of guilt, shock and terror. The pair aren’t in the movie long—a terrible decision—but they make the most of their slight roles.
In fact, most of the actual activity inside the silo is decent: A familiarity with and respect for process (both in how an accident like that physically affects its victims and in the details of how they may be rescued) show that Burnette and his screenwriter Jason Williamson not only did their homework, but have a knack for translating what they learned. If only they stuck to their corn-covered guns.