In Tyler Michael James’ feature debut, Low Life, a YouTuber who catches predators online goes too far in his quest for vigilante justice.
When we first meet small-time YouTube star Benny Jansen (Wes Dunlap), he’s doing what he does best. He’s on camera, flashing his biggest smile and oozing charisma as he lies in wait for a paedophile he’s arranged to meet. Of course, they don’t think they’re meeting Benny. They think they’re meeting an underage girl, and Benny takes incredible satisfaction in exposing them to the world in his videos. That’s an average day for him, catching and exposing the predators that the police don’t prosecute.
It’s all pretty simple, until the night he lets one of them into his own home. Teenage superfan Nicole (Lucy Urbano) is suspicious of her best friend’s dad, and puts Benny under pressure to catch him as quickly as possible.
The vast majority of the story that follows is set in one room, as Benny and his reluctant friends attempt to trick Jason (Lucas Neff) into confessing on camera. The film is hampered a little bit by the amount of time it spends in Benny’s house, and starts to feel a bit one-note at times, but the scenario is set up skillfully to add tension and time pressure. We’re left feeling uncertain about how the night will end and whether Benny will manage to catch him out.
However, the game of cat and mouse that unfolds isn’t one where Benny tries to outwit Jason, but one where he tries to say the most disgusting things to get him on side. This isn’t particularly exciting – it feels an example of a film trying to get your attention through shock factor.
Throughout all of this, though, Wes Dunlap gives an excellent performance. He’s exceedingly charismatic, but is also great at showing the cracks in Benny’s mask, leading us to believe there’s an ulterior motive keeping him going. One of the best things this film does is make him a character of questionable morality. It would be easy to see Benny as a good guy doing a good thing out of the kindness of his heart, but Low Life wants to dig into his psyche more than that.
It’s not just a story about vigilante justice, but about the hypocrisy often involved in it, and the type of people that engage in it. Benny acts like his cause is righteous and he’s beyond reproach, yet his morals quickly become flexible when it comes to his methods. As things spiral out of control, the film heads into more typical crime thriller territory.
This is where it becomes a bit more generic. From the moment the situation slips out of Benny’s control it’s painfully clear how the movie must end, and the air comes out of it a little. What begins as an interesting premise on the morals of vigilante justice slopes off in a more conventional direction.
Going spoiler-very light, there seems to be an attempt to liven things up and escape the shackles of the one room setting for an explosive finale, but it doesn’t quite fit. There’s even a mini (in terms of scale, not the make of the car) car chase, but the same problem. It’s an ambitious way to try to end the film, but it’s feels too easy to see where things are going. But still, if you don’t mind a bit of predictability this is a solid crime thriller, and Wes Dunlap is excellent as complex protagonist Benny.
Low Life screened at the Raindance Film Festival.
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