In Night of the Hunted, Alice is travelling home from a night with her lover, John, when they stop at a remote gas station. It’s the early hours of the morning, no one else is around, and while John is filling up the car at the pumps, Alice heads into the station to pay.
Within moments of stepping inside the building, Alice notices blood on the wall behind the counter. Seconds later, an unseen sniper begins to shoot at her.
With bullets coming through the window, Alice becomes trapped inside. Her only way of escape is to avoid the sniper’s line of fire and try to work out who is targeting her and why.
Directed and co-written by Franck Khalfoun, Night of the Hunted stars Camille Rowe, Jeremy Scippio and Aleksandar Popovic. The film is a low budget dark-thriller, built on suspense and tension, and is predominantly set in and around a US gas station.
As the premise suggests, the film works largely from a simple concept, and features very few players. There’s also not a great deal of story and the spectacle is kept quite low.
However, Night of the Hunted is very effective. Sure, the sniper plotline has been used before, on both film and television, but director Franck Khalfoun finds ways to keep things feeling fresh.
Night of the Hunted wastes no time getting into the main thrust of its story and presents a good mix of action and ideas. Once the sniper’s motivation kicks in, the film is able to delve into some social and political commentary too, and this gives the picture some contemporary bite.
Alice is the lead in the film and she is the character who is essentially put through the wringer. Across the movie’s 90-minute run-time, Alice is shot at multiple times, is forced to barricade herself behind gas station shelves, and is both physically and mentally attacked by the sniper.
Camille Rowe takes on the role of Alice and she is excellent as the harassed and harangued victim who gets caught up in a game of cat and mouse. Rowe spends a great deal of time working solo, or playing off against a voice on a walkie-talkie, and she handles everything marvellously.
For the most part, the sniper is kept off screen, meaning Rowe often has to act or react without anyone to physically play off against. The decision to keep the sniper hidden gives Rowe the opportunity to display her acting skills, while at the same time the mystery surrounding the sniper’s identity helps to maintain the suspense and energy.
While Night of the Hunted isn’t entirely original, and it may not wow everyone, what it lacks in originality it makes up for in tension, and it certainly utilises its limited budget in an effective way too. Similar to films such as Phone Booth (2002) or Buried (2010), it takes a low-concept idea, finds a way to make it engrossing, and runs with it.
Should you wish to check out Night of the Hunted, the film will be playing in UK cinemas and available to stream on Shudder from Friday 20th October. Night of the Hunted will then be released on video-on-demand platforms from Monday 20th November.
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