Promise

While on vacation a young couple jumps straight into a flashback: when “douche magnet” Selene (Noelle Wheeler) attracts the attention of Jesse (Kurt Kubicek) at a party they instantly hit it off, albeit in an uncomfortably sober twenty-something kind of way. Now on a camping trip together, their plans for a little backwoods R&R are interrupted by a spike strip laid across the country road on which they’re traveling.

The sheriff’s truck that just passed them hits the spikes first and comes to a halt, but as Sergeant Lane exits the vehicle and comes back to check on the kids someone shoots him in the neck. Armed men wearing ski masks and camouflage materialize out of the woods, and in the ensuing panic Jesse runs away into the forest, leaving Selene to fend for herself. The girl is pulled from the car while another one of the attackers chases Jesse off into the night with a machete. The kid somehow manages to knock the guy out with a rock, and taking the man’s pistol and blade Jesse heads back to the cars.

At the vehicles Jess finds the police officer’s decapitated corpse, along with one of the masked attackers. Jesse guns him down in a panic, and as the other troops take a head count and send one of their number back to the crash site Jesse desperately tries to get help on the radio in Sergeant Lane’s Dodge Ram. And experiences a flashback of young love. (Or young tease, anyway.)

When the memory byte ends we find a crew of people cleaning up the Dodge truck. And wondering what happened to “Brother Riker.” Jesse meanwhile is following tire tracks along one of the dirt roads winding through the woods: somewhere ahead of him one of the gang, Brother Mason (Seth Gandrud), has driven Selene out to a farmhouse in the middle of the woods where she’s entrusted to another woman, Amy, who’s told to clean her up.

Out on the road Jesse is suddenly felled by a sniper’s bullet. As he lies on the ground the hunter approaches for the kill shot, but as Jesse recovers he chases the man off with a few rounds from Brother Riker’s pistol. All of them, actually; armed now only with Riker’s machete Jesse waits as the hunter circles around for another try. In the brief hand-to-hand that follows the attacker takes his own combat knife in the belly, and Jess takes the man’s assault rifle and again heads off after Selene.

At the farmhouse another young girl, Bethany (Tiffany Shepis), appears to have just been raped by the head of the clan, Brother Abraham (Ron Bowen). Deed done, the soiled-looking fallen preacher-type promptly hands the crying naked girl over to Brother Mason, her new “spiritual husband.” Mason takes the girl in hand, cautioning her against asking after someone named Christopher, as well as against contacting the “secular authorities” again. Which is why the trap was laid for Sergeant Lane in the first place: the cultists don’t much care for people interfering in their ways of rape and murder in the name of the Lord.

It appears that Jesse and Selene really did just happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Elsewhere in the house a handcuffed Selene is being tended to by the matronly Amy when Abraham and Mason enter for a little spiritual pep talk with the girl. And to give her a slap in the face for her ungodly insubordination when they find that she isn’t so eager to be filled with God’s love. Left alone to reconsider her secular ways, Selene experiences another uncomfortable relationship flashback.

As Brother Abraham turns an evening meal into a self-righteous piety play, Jesse has reached the farmhouse on foot and let himself into the garage. Moving into the main house he starts checking rooms one by one, looking for Selene. In one room he finds a phone and makes a call to 911, but is interrupted by Abraham before the call can be completed. Dishonest Abe then walks on down the hall and lets himself into Selene’s room for another creepy intervention, but when he gets to the “Now let me lay my hands upon you” part Selene fights back, forcing the “prophet” to pull a straight razor on her. Before any more damage can be done, Jesse shows up and clocks Abraham in the face with the butt of his rifle.

The young couple takes time out for a weepy reunion before setting their sights on escape. During which time little Zachary, one of Abraham’s prodigious brood who looks very much like one of the Children of the Corn, has fetched his mother Amy. When she comes up to check on Abe’s holy rolling-in-the-hay shenanigans, Jess and Selene attempt the old tying-the-bedsheets-into-rope trick in order to escape out of the window. Just as another soldier of Christ, Brother Cyrus, joins the party and begins chopping through the bedroom door with his machete. Selene makes it down to the ground, only to be attacked by knife-wielding breeder Amy, while upstairs Jesse blasts Cyrus through the eye with a well-placed rifle round. Avoiding the increasingly psychotic little Zachary Jesse hits the ground, and helping Selene subdue Amy the young lovers head into the woods.

Hot on their heels is young Zachary and his brothers, all of whom are now packing heat. A sheriff’s truck pulls up just in time and Jesse, thinking this is the response from his frantic 911 call from before, quickly drops his rifle. Whereupon Brother Mason, wearing a policeman’s uniform, steps out of the vehicle and shoots him at point blank range, leaving him for the children.

Unconscious, Jesse revisits another intimate moment with Selene. This time she acts oddly when presented with an early graduation present of a heart-shaped necklace: “I should have told you this earlier, but I didn’t realize I’d feel this way about you,” she says. Unexpected news follows, to which Jesse does not take well.

When he wakes up Jesse is in the truck, being driven off into the night by Brother Mason. Of Selene there is no sign. And from there things don’t much look like they’re going to get much better.

With all of the deluded cult members still on the loose the ending manages to draw itself out for some time, and it isn’t without its small melodramas. One important scene in particular is markedly hard to swallow, and the final weepy piano-led scene tying into the title is really a little much. There may be a certain low-budget backwoods soap opera feel to the story that does draw you in, but the whole Branch Davidian concept could have been fleshed out a bit more. Aside from their leader’s belief in polygamy, preparation for the secular apocalypse, and the mortal excommunication of the more desirable females’ ex’s, not to mention his own declaration of being the human embodiment of God’s word, the cult’s activities and principles aren’t really made clear.

The indie style soundtrack is a little canned but no worse than many (at least not until the finale). The dialogue however is even flatter, making the chemistry between Jesse and Selene seem strained even in their more ‘intimate’ moments. The youth of the protagonists sometimes works against them here: Selene emotes with an almost doll-like lack of personality, and Jesse carries a smartassed look on his face throughout much of the picture. Even when he’s being shot.

Speaking of which, despite his girls’ socks Jesse proves to be remarkably resilient throughout most of the film. I mean, taking a sniper’s bullet for a woman whom he may or may not have slept with is a pretty strong commitment. The action scenes themselves are a little quick and forced, which may be more realistic but if you’re not paying close attention you might miss a fatal wound.

Not the strongest mix of petty rebellion and cultic devotion, but fairly watchable.

There are multiple special features on the promotional DVD, although these will not appear on the official release. These include “Promise: Behind the Scenes” which segues nicely into the “Promise Blooper Reel,” and you also get Ron Bowen’s audition for Abraham along with feature commentary by producers and crew.

– Tom Crites