Widow Violet goes on a date at some swank restaurant. Violet's phone receives messages from some unknown creeper telling her that she either kills said date or said creeper will off her son and sister (who are at home nearby). That's the gist of 2025's Drop, a workmanlike thriller that sometimes slows to a halt and other times comes on like gangbusters (especially when nearing its coda). Violet, well she is played by Meghann Fahy, a little known actress but a future star in the making, leading lady. "Please, what do you want from me?" Oh not much, just keep doing your thang Meghann. Keep that dream alive.
So yeah, Drop is not really an exercise in style nor does it possess any swooping camerawork and/or mad storytelling from perspectives. I mean I could only imagine what could have been had Brian De Palma or Pete Travis got a hold of this material, giving the audience member some sort of Rashomon effect complete with a few gnarly tracking shots. Yup, that would be neato.
New Hollywood generation helmers and unique plot devices aside, what Drop lacks in modus operandi it gains in provided suspense, some gaslighting, and a little nasty tension. It's a whodunit, a who done did it, satiny and glossy and bent on showing the glitz and glitter of Chicago (the film's setting). No, you don't have to adjust your eyes, it's not Tokyo or Malaysia you're looking at, it's the City of Big Shoulders. Clearly the location scout hadn't been in the loop (pun intended).
Drop, yeah it feels like Die Hard in an eatery or some Halle Berry actioner from a few years ago. Barring a few annoying characters (chiefly a waiter) and some major implausibility, it's compact, isolated, and examined, a one-milieu stage play that eventually turns steadily violent. I enjoyed it, I got into it, but in the back of my head I knew it was capable of being so much more twists and turns begot. "Drop anchored".
Written by Jesse Burleson
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