Movie Review: Hellacious Acres: The Case of John Glass

By Angela Roberts

August 1, 2011

John Glass poster

One of the benefits of film festivals is that they’re generally open to films from big studios and indie filmmakers alike. And if you’re an indie filmmaker who’s just made a kind of off-the-wall science fiction film, where else do you take it but to the Fantasia film festival? Hellacious Acres: The Case of John Glass is one such movie, made on a shoestring budget by Quebecois filmmaker Pat Tremblay. It was certainly an uncommon choice of mine to watch it, and for a while I thought I was going to be the only pass holder attending (a sad fact of homegrown Canadian cinema is the lack of attention it gets from the media, even at home). I wasn’t even sure if I’d like it; the description had been enough to attract my interest, but still make me a little wary of the content. But it surprised me, both because it’s actually quite impressive for the budget it was made on (amazing what one can do with After Effects these days) and because I found the pacing and plot to be pretty good.

It’s an odd and dark and morbidly comic film. The premise is this; John Glass wakes from cryogenic sleep in a decrepit barn to discover that the world has been devastated not only by World War Three, but also by a subsequent alien invasion. He’s trapped in a skintight rubber suit that he can’t take off because the atmosphere is not breathable. And he’s been informed that he’s been tasked with a life or death mission to retrieve extremely important codes that hold the key to saving the world. Too bad he can’t remember anything from before he woke up. Then he might care more. But it’s not like he has anything else to do. So John Glass sets out, encountering crazed survivors, creepy aliens, an unfortunate comrade, psychotropic side effects, and a lot of walking. >b>A lot of walking.

You’d think from that description that the film would be boring. But it’s not. There isn’t much action, but you don’t feel it. Sound propels you forward in this film, whether it’s through narration, dialogue, or music. For a science fiction film that relies heavily on listening to texts, Glass’ suit computer and the log entries of his dead colleague the most obvious ones that come to mind, the film is not heavy on exposition. For all we’re told, we don’t really get an exhaustive picture of what has happened to the world. And it works. Probably because Glass is so apathetic about it. You don’t feel like you’re being fed exposition.

Another point of note is Tremblay’s use of visuals. He plays with all the film tricks he can think of; texture, graininess, washed-out colours, psychotropic camera movements. All to convey the sense of this post-apocalyptic wasteland. It’s really quite impressive how he makes the Quebec countryside look like a post-World War 3 war torn world.

The film isn’t for every science fiction fan. You’ve got to be open, you’ve got to be willing to sit through something really different, and you’ve got to be able to appreciate a very dark, very sardonic sense of humour. Interestingly, though he claims to not be much of a gamer, Tremblay’s film evokes a lot of video game tropes and parodies them. He’s perhaps part of a generation where the tropes of science fiction and those of a certain genre of video games have melded, and you have to understand that melding to get the jokes. It’s geek humour. And those who do get it, and there were many in that audience of friends, family and curious strangers who did. You might too.

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