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THE KILLING ZONE
Malcolm Ojowcu ( Issach de Bankole') is a New Jersey doctor with a failing practice. His wife, Jennifer, tries to be supportive, but has made the decision to go back to work while their son is in school. Then Malcolm's adoptive father and sponsor into the country, Dr. Atong Stevens (Peter Frances James) offers Malcolm a job at his clinic in Brooklyn. The pay is good, the hours are short and it's a pretty easy gig. Basically, he makes house calls to dementia patients and convinces them to come back to the clinic where they can get their medication. It's during one of these house calls that Malcolm witnesses a purse-snatching by a couple of kids and tries to stop it. Twist (Samuel Paul), one of the thieves shoots and kills Dr. Stevens.
Produced by Michele Stephenson
Written and Directed by Joe Brewster
Edited by Tom McArdle
Director of Photograhy - Zoran DrakulicIssach de Bankole' - Malcolm Ojowcu
Sonja Sohn - Jennifer Ojowcu
Peter Frances James - Dr. Atong Stevens
Rony Clanton - Johnny Iton
Samuel Paul - Twist
This event triggers flashback to Malcolm's life in South Africa during the war. Dr. Stevens was basically his savior, taking young Malcolm back to America with him and giving him a better life. Malcolm starts to obsess about who killed his only real friend in the world. This takes him into a dangerous part of New York nicknamed The Killing Zone.
Now Malcolm must immerse himself in The Killing Zone to find the answers to the senseless crime. Ignoring his family, his work, everything he fought so hard for to bring to justice the murderer that shattered his world.
THE KILLING ZONE is on the surface just another melodrama about how urban life can be so senselessly destructive. But then it takes a bizarre turn. Having Malcolm being a survivor of the wars that riddled South Africa in the seventies brings a different perspective to the film. Usually you have the man who is thrust into the savagery of the big city. In Malcolm's case, this may be a horrific crime, but he's seen worse. Much worse. He can actually relate to the twelve year old who committed the crime. He's also world wise enough to know that no child would commit such a heinous crime without some sort of adult supervision. In this case it would be a client of the clinic who suffers from schizophrenia. His name is Johnny Aton (Rony Clanton) and he lives in the basement of the neighborhood catholic church. It's there that he recruits young people to steal from the well off people in the neighborhood.
In one of the scariest points of the picture, Aton is giving young Twist lessons on who to steal from and who not to. When he asks Twist who has all the money, the young man replies, 'white people'. This makes Aton laugh and shake his head. His reply is, 'that's true, but if you don't want to be on eyewitness news you better just kill and steal from black people'. Aton's sweaty, twitching delivery of the line makes your skin crawl. The man is the ultimate racist. He knows that by slaughtering his own race that the police will do little to stop it and that the media will ignore him.
And that's the scary tone of this film. The man indirectly responsible for the killing that propels this entire film is a schizophrenic madman who preys on his own people, knowing full well that he'll get away with it.
The performances in the film are great. Issach de Bankole' is magnificent in the role of Malcolm. His determination to find the person who killed his friend is evident without him saying a word. His expressions convey the intensity of the performance. and Samuel Paul as Twist practically steals the show. Here is a young man who only wants to have a normal life. The circumstances that he is born into are driving him down a path of destruction, but maybe there is a glimmer of hope for his survival. All in all, this is a great film. This is one of those types of films that have a strong message on the state of urban blight. How people will prey on one another to find just the basic necessities of life and how sad that condition is. Hopefully this film will receive the recognition it deserves.
Bio Info for Douglas Waltz
In the spare time afforded him between a full time job for the local phone company, Douglas is happily married with five, that's right five, children. He is a staff writer for the Print magazine Cult Cuts and does work for the webzine (www.cultcuts.net). He also publishes his own small press zine called X-Ploitation. In addition to that he's working on an annual publication of short stories from various writers called On The Night Highways. And if that wasn't enough he's about to shoot his first short film, Phone Sex, sometime this summer.