Pressure (2002)

To me, this movie is perfection.

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Absolutely the worst movie.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Pressure is a low budget thriller with a well designed plot, a couple of compelling villains and a surprising number of thrills. The only thing it doesn't have is some gratuitous nudity and, frankly, this movie is good enough that it doesn't need it.Steve and Patrick (Kerr Smith and Lochlyn Munro) are a couple of med students driving through the back roads of Oregon. Steve's an uptight grinder who tries to keep everything under control. Patrick is the life of the party who skates through life with a smile on his face. They pull into a roadside bar which just happens to be hosting a college cheerleader convention. Patrick thinks he's in heaven, but Steve just wants to get back to his med student girlfriend Sara (Michelle Harrison). Patrick talks him into staying for one beer and while his buddy cavorts, Steve is propositioned by the "bar hot" Amber (Angela Featherstone).Against his better judgment, Steve follows her out into the parking lot but stops himself before it goes to far. Then Amber's fat faced boyfriend Bo (Adrien Dorval) whacks Steve in the head with a 2x4. They've made a little business out of mugging travelers like Steve and Bo drags him into the woods to have some fun. He pulls out a gun and starts shooting around Steve, until Bo accidentally shoots himself. Steve thinks he's been saved. Then Bo turns out to be a local deputy and calls for back up, claiming Steve shot him. That sends Steve and Patrick on the run, pursued by the county sheriff (Donnelly Rhodes) who happens to be Bo's father. As the carnage and death toll mounts, the FBI become involved and the media get hold of Steve's story, which brings Sara up to Oregon to see what she can do. As Steve and Patrick find themselves deeper and deeper in trouble, they have to go to greater and greater extremes to stay alive.Pressure is a fine example of how important plot is to making a successful melodrama. This isn't a production about subtle characterization or thematic depth. It's about the characters moving from crisis to crisis and barely managing to crawl out the other side. A story like this needs two things above all else. One is speed, and this film moves along at a crackerjack pace. There are not only no wasted scenes, there are hardly any wasted seconds. You can't overestimate the value of constant forward movement in this sort of movie.The second necessary thing is to have more than one thing going on. Melodramas are looked at as simpler and shallower than serious drama, but they do need a certain amount of narrative complexity to work well. They need to have multiple conflicts spread out amongst multiple characters, moving both in parallel and converging. Pressure, for example, does not just focus on Steve and Patrick's scramble to survive. It also has a subplot on the abusive relationship of Bo and Amber. He's a seething boil of resentment and insecurity who takes it all out on her and the pressure that builds up on Amber mirrors the tension that Steve is going through. And then there's a tertiary conflict between the sheriff and the FBI over who's going to catch Steve and additional levels of interpersonal strife between Patrick and Steve over who got them into this mess, Steve and Sara over what he did or didn't do with Amber and even Bo and his father.Those two characters and the men who play them are the real stars of this film. Bo is such a contemptible, stupid bully that after he gets shot in the dick once, you dislike him so much you want to see him get shot in the dick again. Adrien Dorval does a great job embodying just about every negative thing about overgrown boys who think they're men. Bo's father, on the other hand, is definitely a man. A blocky union of intensity and deliberation, the sheriff is able to hold life and death in his hands with equanimity. Donnelly Rhodes forcefully portrays one of the most imposing challenges any melodrama hero has ever run up against.Now, the last 20 minutes of Pressure is a bit too dependent on the sheriff getting far too kill crazy to be realistic and the film does seem to think it gave Steve more of a character arc than it actually did, but those are minor flaws.In the barren wasteland of low budget cinema, Pressure is an oasis of entertainment. Watch it.

... that`s what it said on the info button of my remote control and this intrigued me because what sort of madmen think they can make " A breakneck yarn of redneck cops and cheerleaders " ? Well director Richard Gale and co-writer Craig Brewer think they can .As you`d might expect with " A breakneck yarn of redneck cops and cheerleaders " PRESSURE is rubbish . It includes many dumb situations involving logic , characterisation and stereotyping . Actually stereotyping is the thing that stuck out in my mind as the cops here are as you`d expect in a rural American state - Inbred , inter related and a bigger menace to society than any local criminal , a sort of cross between the drill instructor from FULL METAL JACKET and the pig fetish freaks from DELIVERANCE. But I also wish to say credit where it`s due because despite ludicurous and very dumb PRESSURE is a fairly entertaining movie and even though Richard Gale and Craig Brewer are very possibly mad for wanting to do " A breakneck yarn of redneck cops and cheerleaders " I never felt like switching the TV off . Let`s hope they don`t get stopped for speeding by state troopers on a lonely road

I've seen "Pressure" a few months ago when I rented the DVD at blockbuster videos. I thought it was just okay as first but I afterwards saw the special features including a small featurette about the making of the movie. Actors sat down and talked about the movie's actual message. So when I saw the movie for the second time, I found it much more entertaining once you've understand what the hell is going on !"Pressure" tells the story of Steve (Kerr Smith) and Patrick (Lochlyn Munro) who are two medical students back from a conference heading for California. On their way home, they stop at a bar somewhere in Oregon where they get into trouble when Steve gets involved with the wrong girl (Angela Featherstone). The rest of the movie is one big chase scene where Steve and Patrick must prove their innocence.*SPOILERS*Don't read this part if you haven't seen the movie. Unless of course you're not willing to see it at all.As I was saying, Steve gets involved with a girl who manages to take him outside of the bar for a few minutes. Steve is attacked by her boyfriend with whom she robs his belongings. But that's not all. Her boyfriend is some kind of crazy idiot who likes to see people suffer to feel in control. So he brings Steve out in the woods to scare the hell out of him but accidently shoots his balls off when he triggers his gun in his pants. Steve manages to escape with Patrick. Unfortunately, the guy who shots himself is a cop and his father is the sheriff. You guess about the rest.I personally think that "Pressure" was a good movie by director Richard Gale. Do you know he shot this movie in 18 day ?!! Incredible is the results if you watch the movie and its special features. It will explain you what you'll probably won't understand while viewing the film. Overall, "Pressure" is a nice little chase movie like many others except that it stands altogether. The script is solid, the direction is good and the acting is average. A good movie for people who've enjoyed "The fugitive" and "Rambo". Not as violent as both of these, though. Rent this movie. It's worth it. I rate it 7/10.

Pressure is something of a paradox. It plays like an above-average TV movie, but at times does better than standard hollywood fare in avoiding plot cliches and explosion-driven narratives.Kerr Smith, probably familiar from Dawson's Creek, is pretty likeable as the young man caught up in a series of freak mishaps which leave him hunted by the local police for a crime he didn't commit. There are some dodgy moments (The old camera spinning round the head as he tries to stay sane moment leaps to mind) but overall it's undemanding and he does fine. The supporting cast does fine, Lochlyn Munro is best as his unbelievably loyal friend (You're the subject of a statewide manhunt and waving a gun around while covered in blood? Let's go!) and the sheriff is suitably psychotic. That's the main character problem with the film - some of the characters are just so damn nasty it makes them somewhat unbelievable.The narrative is the film's strong point, although it tails off a bit in the second half. The way that things fall apart in the first place is suitably plausible and it's a shame that the same inventiveness couldn't continue through the whole script. Things stay pretty tense though, and really the only complaint is that it ends a bit easily and perhaps should have been drawn out a bit longer - hardly the worst criticism of a film.So overall - not a bad way to kill 90 minutes on a sunday afternoon.