A comedy of errors but with a serious tone the film 7 Minutes comes to Blu-ray and DVD with a story that may seem a bit familiar, yet fun to watch. The low budget movie has a recognizable cast good uses of their fine talent within the loosely scripted storyline. If you like movies that get to the point, are action based and are not complicated, then invite your best buds over for a brewski or two and whoop it up with 7 Minutes.
Married to his high school sweetheart Kate (Leven Rambin), Sam (Luke Mitchell) has just been laid off. With his wife pregnant he takes a side job delivering weed for his brother Mike (Jason Ritter) as small time dealer. In the meantime Owen (Zane Holtz), Sam’s best friend, has just been released from jail after serving a term for shoplifting. The three get together for a one time drug deal for Doug (Chris Soldevilla) a crazy supplier who’s gun crazy. The deal goes bad when they have to flush the drugs and find themselves in need of $68,000. To get free from Doug the boys have to rob Owen’s uncle Pete (Joel Murray) who has money stashed from a heist as his mortgage company. So begins the story of mistakes, mishaps and trying to live up to the motto of Owen’s father (Kris Kristofferson), “never get caught”.
The wacky little film moves along at a very fast pace under the direction of Jay Martin who also wrote the script. Martin does a little juggling using flashbacks to establish the characters, showing the robbery in cutaways, but never losing the flow needed to keep the high level of excitement. It’s not Dog Day Afternoon, but it has some of the feel of that “whatever could go wrong will”. Martin uses a lot of close-ups showing the brutal way the three men deal with the people in the mortgage company during the robbery.
The acting by the main trio is very good. Luke Mitchell (TV’s “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D”.) and Jason Ritter (W., TV’s “Parenthood) look a lot alike so as brothers in character that helps a lot. Each has their own problems with money with Sam trying to get out of the town he grew up in so his wife and expectant child will have a better life. Mike needs a big score to keep his family going and Owen played by Zane Holtz (TV’s “From Dusk to Dawn”) wants to show his father that he can commit a crime and “not get caught”. The three work very well together and deliver the needed excitement to the film.
Special Bonus Features: The Blu-ray has a couple of bonus features, but quite unusual.
“Linier Heist” This is very cool. The whole robbery scene is shown without the cutaways for flashbacks. After watching the movie flip on this feature and see it all in real-time.
“Storyboard to Scenes” Writer and Director of 7 Minutes Jay Martin is a famous storyboard artist working on films like Amazing Spider-Man 2, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and I Am Legend. Here he show how he mapped out the scenes beyond the robbery in storyboard fashion.
7 Minutes has not been rated by the MPAA, but contains language, drug use, violence, sex and nudity.
FINAL ANALYSIS: Good entertainment for the men who like “in your face” action. (C+)
Specifications and additional video information:
Cast: Leven Rambin Zane Holtz Jason Ritter Kris Kristofferson Luke Mitchell Joel Murray Kevin Gage Russell Hodgkinson Chris Soldevilla Brandon Hardesty
Director and writer: Jay Martin
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller (dog day afternoon)
Running Time: 1 hr. 32 min.
Original Theatrical Release Date: June 26, 2015
Video Release Date: September 1, 2015
Language: English
Reviewed Format: Blu-ray (also available on DVD)
Audio: Dolby True HD 5.1
Video: Widescreen Presentation Aspect Ratio 1.40:1
Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish
Number of Discs: 1 Disc
Distributed by: Anchor Bay
Writer, critic, film editor John Delia, Sr. has been on all sides of the movie business from publications to film making. He has worked as a film critic with ACED Magazine for more than 20 years and other publications for a total of 40 years. He earned a Bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of Florida. John is a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association and Critics Association of Central Florida Send John a message at jdelia@acedmagazine.com
