“INESCAPABLE” – MOVIE REVIEW #TIFF12

Adib (Alexander Siddig) is a wanted Man. After being accused of being a Traitor to his native Syria and marked for a Death Sentence, he flees to Toronto and begins what would be a settled life with his Wife and Daughter, Muna (Jay Anstey).Refusing to open-up about his mysterious past to his Daughter, she goes on a journey to connect with her roots, but goes missing after her identity is uncovered on a visit to Damascus.

On a desperate mission to locate his Daughter, Adib finds himself reuniting with a past love in Fatima (Marisa Tomei), who never has quite forgiven him for his sudden departure from her life. He also must call upon an old Friend scorned by his sudden estrangement in Sayid (Oded Fehr), now a powerful Government Official and a crucial asset in helping reunite him with his Daughter. Canadian Director Ruba Nadda’s Inescapable has us joining Adib as he faces the consequences of his past, searching feverishly for his Daughter and more importantly, fighting to stay alive.

Inescapable is a little bit of everything. This is good in that it keeps the Viewer engaged, but at the same time it detracts from the focus of the Story, which ultimately is about a Father’s fight for his Daughter. And if anything, perhaps even more detail could have been given to subplots like Adib and Fatima’s emotional undercurrent and also more could have been done to make the Father-Daughter storyline a bit deeper for us to feel truly what’s at stake here.

The first two-thirds of the Film is paced like a Drama, but in an interesting turn, decidedly it becomes more Action-oriented: fist-fights and guns. Siddig is a pleasure to watch, delivering a tour-de-force of tireless intensity, albeit over-the-top at times, and Tomei transforms completely as a Syrian Woman, looking and sounding every bit the part.

The Version of Inescapable I previewed pre-TIFF 2012 had a number of choppy edits which although forgivable really should be tightened – the only hint of there being any budget constraints in this beautiful-looking Film, which looks far more expensive than its $6 million budget suggests.