DARK NIGHT American Independents

Tim Sutton’s third feature is a quiet meditation on the planning and impact of a Cineplex massacre in a suburban town, taking place over the course of one day, from sunrise to midnight. Loosely inspired by the horrific real-life killings in a Colorado movie theater in 2012, Sutton doesn’t apply a political message to this story, focusing instead on six strangers in a suburban town, all characters who embody real life archetypes in a realistic version of middle-American life. In doing so, Sutton subverts the audience’s expectations of who the shooter in this fictional world could be. The film is beautifully shot by prolific French cinematographer Hélène Louvart, who lends a different perspective and cultural lens to this unfortunately very American story. DARK NIGHT engages with our epidemic of mass shootings in subtle and unsettling ways by taking an observational and expressionistic approach that creates an immersive experience in which the audience may examine their own fragility. — Jenn Murphy