Karen’s life is filled with all the trappings of contentedly middle-class suburbia. She has a beautiful house, a handsome husband, an adorable daughter and an enviable wardrobe. But her distant gaze hints that her heart isn’t really in her Stepford wife existence. Plus, she has a Northsider accent, and in the grand tradition of Dublin stereotypes, this clearly means she has a shady backstory.
And indeed her past catches up with her in the form of Karl (Allen Leech), an ex-boyfriend who’s fresh out of prison for a crime Karen was somehow involved in. He claims an old acquaintance has information that could ruin Karen’s tidy life, but his agenda is unclear and nothing is ever quite what it seems.
IFTA-winner Amy Huberman holds this dramatic thriller together, bringing both spark and vulnerability to her role as the enigmatic Karen. Her fiery personality shines through during scenes with Karl, and their volatile relationship is genuinely intriguing. As the alternatively intoxicating and terrifying bad boy, Leech is also superb, and his domineering presence imbues all of his scenes with a gripping tension.
But try as they might, Leech and Huberman between them can’t turn this curiously mixed film into a masterpiece. The few supporting characters are oddly underdeveloped, and the two leads remain stuck in a cycle of repetitive shouting matches that aren’t quite meaningful enough to sustain interest for the film’s duration.
Visually, director and award-winning cinematographer PJ Dillon seems to be grasping for something that he can’t quite capture. There are innumerable blurry shots where the focus is inexplicably placed on light fixtures or taps, and though they’re pretty once or twice, the feeling of emptiness is distracting.
Rewind has interesting moments and the brooding dramatic atmosphere is frequently powerfully evoked, but it also has a lot of unrealised potential. The end result is a film that acts as a showcase for two great actors – but falls well short of greatness itself.