If you are even slightly interested in the Radius film, I don't recommend you to watch the trailer at all. It spoils the first 30 minutes from the first second, and then it gives away important parts of the plot.
Radius, movie (2017) - Watch the trailer on YouTube
video © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
Article updated: 2023.04.24
The Radius (2017) is a contemporary fantasy drama / thriller film. The movie was reviewed by Kadmon.
Product: Radius, movie (2017)
Original title: Radius
Series: -
Setting: contemporary alternate / fantasy Earth
Product type: Film, Genre: fantasy drama / thriller, Style: sci-fi, fantasy, contemporary fantasy, thriller, amnesia, flashbacks, super-human abilities
Release: Premiere: 2017.07.17 (Fantasia Film Festival), Release: 2017.10.20
Reviewer: Kadmon, Type: Male, 40s, Preferences: Immersive, logical story, consistent setting, prefers surprises to spoilers, prefers establishing elements before referencing them
Watched: very recent (2022.06), first time
Rating: Average (2 out of 3 points), Enjoyment: Weak (2- out of 3 points)
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This is my review of Radius, a contemporary fantasy drama / thriller movie from 2017. It's about a man who gets amnesia, then finds it out that he is in a deadly situation. The Radius film is watchable, but I only recommend it to devoted fans of the genre.
Radius, movie (2017)
image © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
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Review (spoiler-free) - Radius, movie (2017)
I ran into Radius randomly, while looking for something to watch. The premise sounded interesting - although familiar -, but I hoped they'll make something good out of it. I didn't watch the trailer.
The Radius movie is about a man who gets amnesia, then finds it out that he is in a deadly situation.
The basis of the story would be good, but the storytelling is disjointed, making it hard to enjoy the movie. The twists of the story are the only thing that make the movie worthwhile to watch. The consistency is a little off. There are no real character arcs, although the story does play with changes in the characters. There were no logical problems.
The cinematography is okay, the sets are varied, making the movie slightly interesting visually. The few action scenes are easy to follow.
The characters are okay. Their depiction by the actors is good.
The music (by Benoît Charest) is good, fitting the story, but it's not very memorable.
Radius is a watchable contemporary fantasy drama / thriller, that I think only devoted fans of the genre would enjoy.
My experience
I was not satisfied with Radius (2017). I prefer stories without filler scenes and a good dramatic structure, and Radius couldn't deliver that.
Rating: Average (2 out of 3 points). Radius is a watchable film, with some interesting twists.
Enjoyment: Weak (2- out of 3 points). Radius is too long for the story it contains, and offers very few explanations for the main event.
Rewatchability: Low. I think it's mostly the surprise of the story that makes you feel interested. I can't imagine anyone feeling attracted to the story so they would watch this again.
Chance of watching it again: No.
Chance of watching a sequel: Low. I'm interested in the background of the events, but I'd read some reviews before jumping into watching a sequel.
Radius, movie (2017)
image © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
Will you enjoy this?
If you like mystery or thriller movies, you might like Radius.
If you like supernatural or fantasy movies, you might like Radius.
If you like horror or action thriller movies, you might like the film, although there are not many action scenes or scary scenes in the Radius movie.
If you like scientific research stories (Andromeda Strain), you might like Radius, although the focus is not really on the research and investigation.
If you'd like to get comedic moments in your movies, Radius will disappoint you.
If you can get through the first half hour of the movie still interested, rest will be similar, but it also gets slightly better.
If you like to be surprised by the development of events, there are plenty of twists in this movie.
If you prefer visuals over story, you'll be probably bored by Radius.
Things you are required to know to enjoy this
Watching for plot points
If you are interested in contemporary fantasy stories or thrillers, I think it's worth watching the Radius movie for the plot points, although reading the summary might be just enough for that.
Should you watch this on your own screen at home, or is it worth going to the cinema?
I think you'd get a similar experience either way. It's easier to stop watching Radius to change to another movie if you are watching it at home.
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Radius, movie (2017)
image © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
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Review with spoilers - Radius, movie (2017)
I liked the concept of the Radius movie, but I didn't like the actual film.
After the first hour, it started to become boring.
Cover
There are a couple of similar covers for the movie, most of them spoil parts of the story. If you check the cover, you'll already know there's going to be at least one person who is immune to the death field.
The trailer
The trailer is basically a substitute for watching the movie. In the trailer, no surprise twist is left unspoiled.
If you prefer spoilers, it's a great trailer for the Radius film. If you prefer to avoid spoilers, it will ruin the movie for you.
Promise of the first scene
A man wakes up after a car accident. He tries to stop a car, but the driver dies. Then a crow dies. I might think it's some kind of contagion, but as I've read the premise, I know it's the man who causes these deaths. Otherwise, I suspect that a lot more people will die until they come up with a solution - either isolating the man, or killing him. I don't think this would be a story about creating a cure for him.
Execution: I was actually surprised when the man killed himself, so that's a good point for the movie.
Radius, movie (2017)
image © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
Plot summary / Synopsis
A man (Diego Klattenhoff as the man) wakes up after a car accident, near a small town (Woodmore). He tries to stop a car, but the driver suddenly dies. When he calls the emergency services, he comes to the realisation that he can't remember his name. He find his own driver's licence, though, finding out his name (Liam Hartwell).
When he gets to the town, he sees a lot of dead people, and even some people who drop dead. He suspects that this is something airborne, so he tries to protect himself.
Using the address on the driver's licence, he finds his home. Inside his home, he has a flashback, seeing himself in a boat on a lake. On the news, they say that they can't tell if the air is safe to breathe in. When a guy walks near his home, suddenly he just drops dead. Listening to the news, the only common thing between the deaths were that the man was there. He tests his theory, slowly walking towards a bird that suddenly dies. He measures the safe distance, and tries to avoid people.
The police arrives to check on the man, after they've found his abandoned truck, but they quickly back up after they find the dead bodies of animals.
He hides in the shed, to avoid being found. At night, the man dreams about his car accident, and wakes up to see a woman (Charlotte Sullivan as "Jane Doe") coming to his house. He tries to send her away, but she still comes to him - and she seems to be immune to his deadly effect. She says that she was with him in the truck during the accident. She also lost her memories. A dog comes to the man, and also stays alive.
The man has a flashback, and sees that the woman gets into his truck before they start.
They get into a car, and try to drive to the place the man has seen in his flashback. It looks like the presence of the woman stops the deadly effect of the man. When they get to the place, the woman has a flashback, seeing the two of them at the place. They decide to visit the site of the crash.
At the crash site, they find a dead spot on the ground, where even the vegetation is dead. The man tells the woman that he thinks that it was him who caused those deaths, and he suspects that something might have happened to the woman too. This frightens the woman, who runs away from him. A police woman (Kristen Sawatzky as Female Cop) stops by them, and starts asking the man, but when the woman gets far enough, the police woman drops dead. They test it on a goat how far can the woman go until the effect start to work again.
They decide that they go to a hospital, to do an examination on the man, telling that it's due to the memory loss. The doctors can't find anything unusual.
On the news they tell that the dead of the police woman lead the police to the home of the man, where they've found another body, so they decided that he has some kind of biological weapon he uses on the people. The police - knowing that he is in the hospital -, start to chase him. They get away.
After they hide, the news report that they've identified the woman (Rose Daerwood). The husband of the woman sends her a message, calling her home. They decide to meet with the husband, hoping that it will help the woman remember.
They go to the husband (Brett Donahue as Sam Daerwood). They explain the whole thing to him, and the man demonstrates his effect. The husband lends them a place to sleep. They find a missing person poster, showing the woman, but the husband tells her that it was her twin sister (Lily Grayson). The woman has a flashback - she sees herself wanting to commit suicide due to her missing sister, and the man arrived to convince her to stop that, and offered to give her a ride to his house in the country.
They decide to visit that house. The husband doesn't like this idea, so he calls the cops, who arrive and arrest the man and the woman. They separate them, killing everyone nearby. The man and the woman drive away, leaving the husband behind to explain everything.
On a news report they see that something cosmic event happened nearby, that knocked out the satellites.
They reach the man's house, but they are being followed. The man goes to the lake to lie in that boat he has seen, hoping to gets some further memories. Meanwhile, the woman finds a bunch of missing person posters in his house, including the one for her sister, and a new, empty page for the woman herself.
The man has a flashback that he killed her sister, while the woman has a flashback that the man tried to kill her in the truck, that's why they had an accident. They both got out of the truck, and then they were struck by a cosmic lightning.
The woman takes a rifle, and confronts the man. She forces him to get into the lake, and find the body of the sister, but they give up.
A trio of guys followed them here, who think that the man is a terrorist, and they want to deal with him accordingly. The woman starts to run away, but one of them shoots her before they all die because of the deadly effect. He takes the woman to a hospital. When the doctors take her away, he quickly shoots himself in the head.
The setting
Contemporary alternate / fantasy Earth, probably 2017.
Cosmic forces can give humans powers to kill any animal life in a small area, just by being there.
What really happened?
The man, Liam, was a serial killer, who kept a diary about the young girls he had killed. He planned to kill the woman, Rose, next, whose sister Lily, he had killed the year before.
He probably followed the woman, when he saw that she wants to commit suicide. Fearing that it would prevent him from properly killing her - whatever he intended to do with her, probably required a healthy body -, he approached her, and stopped her suicide attempt. He offered her a ride, but she suddenly became suspicious, and wanted to get out of the truck. He wanted to inject her with drugs, but she started to fight, leading to the truck crashing.
Then, while they crawled out of the car to continue fighting, suddenly a cosmic event happened, knocking out the nearby satellites, and striking the area where they stood, knocking both of them out.
The man received the power to kill any animal in his vicinity. The woman received to power to cancel this effect if she is nearby the man.
The woman woke up earlier, and she was found by the police. She got a treatment in a hospital, then she went looking for the man, as they've found that the truck belong to him.
The man woke up later, and this is where the movie begins.
The special powers
Some characters received special powers from a cosmic event.
Killing animals instantly: At the second an animal gets into the vicinity of the user, they instantly die. This is the power of Liam.
Nullify killing field: If the user is nearby someone who has the "Killing animals instantly" power, it cancels its effect. This is the power of Rose.
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Radius, movie (2017)
image © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
Analysis of the story - Radius, movie (2017)
I didn't really like the story. The basic concept was fine, but the lack of interesting events and the small dramatic problems prevented me from completely enjoying Radius.
The message of the story
I'm not sure there's one. "Serial killing young girls is bad"? "Don't get into a stranger's car"? "Don't try to commit suicide if a serial killer is nearby"?
The structure of the story
The scenes of the Radius film are mostly played in sequence, following the same storyline. There are some flashback scenes throughout the movie that show us the events that lead to the start of the movie.
There's no single viewpoint character.
It has the usual arc of the dramatic structure - introduction, action, resolution.
Things I liked
- I liked the twists of the story.
- In most similar stories, the main character gets killed by outside forces. Here, he committed suicide, so that's something I didn't expect.
Problematic elements
The title: Even the title "Radius" is problematic due to being a potential spoiler. Also, it doesn't refer to anything related to the actual story, beyond the fact that the man has a killing radius. Some foreign translations use the title "Zone of Death" or "Deadly Proximity", but these are not much better.
Knowing the premise: The fact that the preview text spoils the first 10-15 minutes made that first 10-15 minutes boring. I would have preferred if they kept it more mysterious, because it made that part somewhat tedious to watch, instead of the potential tension I could have felt.
Armed and dangerous: The fact that they've decided that Liam intentionally kills those people with some kind of biological weapon, and the chase that follows is only there to pad the runtime. And this is at the 40 minute mark, making me feel that the writers ran out of creative ideas even before we've reached half time.
Liam taking walks: Every time he gets out of neutralising area, he kills every animal life in his effect radius. This is practically mass killing. Although it might be foreshadowing his real nature.
No innocent bystanders we would have known: The audience wouldn't fear for the life of the protagonist, but the scenes when they endangered others could have been tense, had we known at least one of those others. But, we didn't. The woman could have had kids, friends, or any other people who would have been important for them. But during the movie nobody important was in danger even for a second.
Supernatural aspect: The supernatural parts of the movie feel unnecessary for the story - it could work just as fine with two people waking up with amnesia after a car accident. We don't get any explanation what really happened, how did it happen, why did it affect them that way, and what will happen after the man died. The only aspect that justifies this fantasy approach is that otherwise I wouldn't have watched it as a regular, non-fantasy thriller. But I still feel this unsatisfying.
Unanswered questions
- Did Liam die at the end?
- Does his effect end when he dies?
- What kind of power did the woman get? Does she only cancel Liam's effect, or is there something more?
- What was that cosmic force? Was it a random event, or was it caused by an intelligent agent?
- Why did the cosmic force come here?
- Did it just dissipate, or did it go through the Earth, and continued to travel forward? Did it remain in our solar system, or did it leave?
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Possibilities of improvement
- Change to title to something less revealing and more interesting.
- Change the preview text to something less revealing.
- Change the cover image to something less revealing. For example, having the guy in a field of dead bodies might be okay.
- Trim some scenes, because it becomes boring after 60 minutes. There's not enough tension in this story.
- Leaving the supernatural parts: I'm not sure if it's possible to cut around those, but that might make this a better story - just a real life drama about two people with amnesia.
How it could have been better?
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How does it compare to the other works of the creators?
I haven't seen any other works of the writer & director pair (Caroline Labrèche & Steeve Léonard).
How does it compare to similar films?
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Behind the scenes
The creators wanted to make a movie about a protagonist who is unable to help people, even though he would like to. The idea sounds okay, but this film didn't really have this story. The protagonist in this movie is more a bystander, and we also find out that he happens to be a serial killer. So I don't think the power of killing people would hinder him that much.
Thoughts about the reviews of others
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Radius, movie (2017)
image © EMAfilms & Peripatetic Pictures
Uses for the film - Radius, movie (2017)
Plot
- Set in a contemporary fantasy setting.
- A cosmic event gives powers to people.
Scenes
- When the main characters get hit by the cosmic event, it could be used to depict characters receiving cosmic powers. Or just to show a way how they are exterminated by cosmic energy.
- When the cops try to get the guy, it could be used to show how police try to contain a person with deadly psychic powers.
Designs
Scenario ideas - Role-playing game scenario ideas
Scenario ideas - Wargame scenario ideas
Killing field: One side gets a unit that is able cause the instant dead of any living unit in a certain radius (2-3 moves). The other side gets a unit that is connected to that killer unit, and it cancels the killing field if the model gets close enough (2-3 moves distance) to the killer unit. Both units are unskilled, they can't use weapons, but they can operate devices, or wear armour that doesn't require special training.
More neutralising unit (easier for the neutralising side): The player with the neutralising unit gets 2-3 models that are able to cancel the effect of the killing field.
No armour for the killer unit (harder for the killer side): The killing field doesn't work if the unit is wearing any kind of armour.
Skilled unit (easier for that side): The killer unit or the neutralising unit is a skilled combatant, it can use weapons, and wear armour that require special training.
Both sides get both units: Both sides get one killer unit and one neutralising unit.
Miniatures - 1/50-1/60 (28-32mm scale)
Civilians: Human-sized (S3) modern (advanced) human female / male civilian.
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Similar stories - Radius, movie (2017)
Short stories
Clifford D. Simak: To Walk a City's Street (1972): In a contemporary setting, they find it out that a man has a radius of effect that cures all illness. Then the people start to die, as they realise that it's because the man carries a deadly disease that first destroys any other illnesses, then the host.
Novels
Graphic novels
Movies
Oldboy (2003): In a contemporary setting, people's lives are connected together due to mysterious circumstances. According to the director, this movie provided inspiration for Radius. Oldboy was a better, and a lot more interesting movie.
Memorîzu / Memories: Stink Bomb (1995): In a contemporary setting, a man gets affected by a dose of experimental chemical, that creates a deadly gas aura around him.
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Frequently asked questions - Radius, movie (2017)
Is the Radius film based on a book or comics?
No, Radius is not based on either books or comics, although it was inspired by a Superman issue.
Is the Radius film a remake or reboot?
No, the Radius film is neither a remake nor a reboot.
Is there a post credit scene in Radius? Does Radius have end credit scenes? Does Radius have a post credit scene?
No, there's no post credit scene in Radius.
Where can I see Radius? What is Radius playing on? What streaming service is Radius on? Where can I watch Radius online? Is Radius available on Netflix? Is Radius on Amazon?
As of 2022.06.09, Radius is available on Amazon Prime Video, Google Play, iTunes, Microsoft Movies, Vimeo, Vudu.
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Resources - Radius, movie (2017)
Official
EMAfilms: Radius: Official article.
Filmoption International: Radius: Official article.
https://www.facebook.com/EMAfilmsCanada/
https://www.facebook.com/radiusmovie/
https://www.instagram.com/radiusmovie/
https://twitter.com/radiusmovie
Information
IMDB: Radius (2017): Database article.
WikiPedia: Radius (film): Database article.
Letterboxd: Radius 2017: Database article.
Rotten Tomatoes: Radius 2017: Database article.
Creation
Tasha Robinson (for The Verge): Radius’ directors explain the problem with making a corpse out of potatoes: Interview article about making the movie.¤
Reviews with no spoilers - Radius film (2017)
: Review video about the Radius film with no spoilers.¤
Reviews with spoilers - Radius film (2017)
Brad Miska (for Bloody Disgusting): Death Awaits Those Who Step Within the ‘Radius’: Short review article of the Radius movie, with spoilers.¤
Analysis - Radius movie (2017)
: Analysis video, explaining the finale of Radius.¤
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Buying the product - Radius, movie (2017)
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Have you seen the Radius film? How do you like the movie? Would you recommend it to others? Do you know reviews or resources you'd like to add? What further thoughts do you have about it? Tell your opinion in the comments!
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