The Infernal Machine Review

What audiences must fear by now is the literal infernal machine keeping Guy Pearce in these straight-to-streaming pieces. It is horrendous, if not a tad funny, to see Pearce still detail quality performances in features that just don’t deserve him. The Infernal Machine is one of many films as of late to enlist his talents and do little with them. Still, it is Pearce, and despite losing his Hollywood shine he has yet to lose the talents that planted him on the map in the first place. A controversial writer, an obsessive fan, and a past in need of confronting all mark a hectic time for Bruce Cogburn (Pearce) and the world director Andrew Hunt fails to glue together.

Shocking it may be that Pearce is given some range to explore here, that is exactly what The Infernal Machine presents him. Opportunity. Not to cement himself on the map, that era is long gone, but it does give Pearce a chance to perform and act with real charm and integrity. Zone 414 offered that chance to him also. Seeing the understated starring man wander through scenes, confident in his abilities, is a side of Pearce audiences have not seen in some time. Articulate direction from Hunt is to praise for that, with great framing not revealing everything all at once as so frequent these low-budget features do. Pearce, struggling in a phone box for clarity on his future, is a remarkable sight. Wrapping that English accent around a very solid performance, Pearce is given a chance to shine, and shine he does.

Its bloated running time aside, it is reassuring to see Pearce has not lost the gift he so often relied on in the likes of Memento and L.A. Confidential. He still has what it takes to slot into the role of leading man and to articulate a great performance. It does get a bit gritty and stock-footage oriented with its opening credits and parts of slow-burning momentum later on, with generic pauses on typewriters and letterheads feeling generic as well as expected for the writer on the run from his past. Misery had much the same issue, but its effectiveness was in what the typewriter represented. It was beyond that of “the leading man is a writer,” it had an active stake in the story. The Infernal Machine does not manage that, but what it does manage is an intense and often exciting bit of slow-burning thrills.

Less appears to be more for The Infernal Machine, which has enough Pearce to enjoy itself with and clarity on where its story hopes to go. Those slow and contemplative moments of a writer confiding in his best friend, a dog named Saul, are the necessary burning embers of a former life that soon take a dark and sinister turn. The Infernal Machine is a diamond in the rough, a quality piece that marks a genuine surprise of an encounter with quality for Pearce, who has been out in the wilderness for so long. He does not return to the mainstream, but has finally found comfort and quality in a performance that should hopefully buffer his star that little bit more.