Too High To Die
Directed by George Nolfi
Starring Anthony Mackie, Morena Baccarin, Maddie Hasson
Released November 8th, 2024
Rated PG-13
Three years ago, sinkholes opened up around the world, unleashing creatures hellbent on killing humans. Just humans! The subterranean monsters were quite successful, wiping out 95% of the world’s population in about a month. The seemingly unkillable aggressors were found to have a strange behavior: they refused to travel higher than 8000 feet. Survivors took refuge on higher ground, leaving the rest of the planet to the strange creatures. We don’t see any of this happen, it’s all told to us in monologues by characters in the movie. That’s one of the main problems with the film, it spends a lot of time telling us things instead of showing us things.
Elevation is set in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, where we meet Will (Anthony Mackie), who is reeling from the loss of his wife Tara (Rachel Nicks), who was killed by the creatures while she was with Nina (Morena Baccarin) on an expedition below the line of safety. Nina is a physicist who is convinced she is close to figuring out how to kill the monsters, colloquially referred to as “reapers,” if only she could get back to her lab to conduct a few experiments.
Will’s young son Hunter (Danny Boyd, Jr.) uses a ventilator at night to breathe, and he’s almost out of filters. Will resolves to venture below the line of safety to ransack a nearby hospital for filters. He says the hospital is sure to have crates of filters there for the taking. Nina goes with him, since her lab is in that hospital. And Will’s pal Katie (Maddie Hasson) tags along, because every horror movie needs expendables. The trio will travel on foot, but plan to take vehicles back to their settlement, since cars and trucks were quickly abandoned when the reapers initially attacked humanity. Good thing these vehicles have batteries that still work, and tires that aren’t flat, and full tanks of gas!
The reapers are large, fast-moving monsters that have the ability to detect Carbon dioxide, which leads to a scene of our protagonists trying to hold their breath when they are in close contact with one of them. The creature design recalls something out of Michael Bay’s Transformers films, overwrought and busy for no reason. They look like a cross between a tank and a cockroach. Beware the tank roaches. There are many questions regarding what the tank roaches are, where they came from, what they want, and whether they can be killed. Don’t expect answers to any but one of these queries.
Elevation offers nothing new in survival horror and fails to deliver thrills or chills. The score by H. Scott Salinas is as derivative as the screenplay by John Glenn, Jacob Roman, and Kenny Ryan. The action scenes are sparse, and the exposition never ends. Even with all of the yapping, we are still left with far too many questions. How did anyone figure out the tank roaches would not travel higher than 8000 feet? Why do people carry around guns if weapons have no effect on the tank roaches? How is a lone physicist closer than the world’s governments to divining a solution to humanity’s dire situation?
There is a mid-credits scene which sets up further stories, and this is exactly the kind of mid-budget thriller that used to get direct-to-DVD sequels back in the day. I would not be surprised if Elevation 2: Tank Roaches is released direct-to-streaming sometime down the road. This movie (or, would-be series of movies) seems designed to appeal to real-life survivalists, those doomsday preppers who spend their paychecks on food that won’t spoil and backyard shelters in case of apocalypse. Perhaps when the end of the world comes those people can hunker down in their bunker with some hardtack and watch Elevation to chill out.