Bushwick is the Birdman of apocalyptic survival movies. There are some cuts to cover the passage of time but the amount of action they pull off in single tracking shots is ambitious and mostly impressive.
When Lucy (Brittany Snow) and her boyfriend arrive at the Bushwick subway stop, they find it eerily vacant. Up the stairs they witness a siege on New York with lots of random violence. Lucy escapes inside where Stupe (Dave Bautista) saves her from some more attackers and teams up with her to get to New Jersey.
The synopsis already gives away that this is a new Civil War so I guess they want you to know, even if the characters only find out by capturing a soldier. That’s even scarier now and probably didn’t seem as prescient when they were filming.
The very first sign of trouble is major and there is plenty of graphic violence throughout. CGI fire is telltale. I can forgive them for not pulling off real pyro in the middle of these complicated tracking shots, although it would’ve been even more impressive if they had.
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This is a solid vehicle for Bautista to be a badass in extreme violence. You may see a body slam in his fights but really it’s more rough and tumble. Stupe has Marine training but it’s not some Zero Dark Thirty style either. It’s just getting the job done. It’s actually more of a vehicle for him to play a normal guy, so he’s not typecast as a superhero or Bond villain. He gets an emotional dramatic monologue and pulls it off nicely.
There’s some Rambo medical action of self-cauterizing wounds. Snow’s reactions to pain are adorable considering the context. There’s some fun background action. I actually wish there was a bit more but look for the Hassidic Jews’ moment.
There are some cuts which I think is fine. No need to contrive a reason to stay tracking just so you can say you did. In other long sequences the cuts are carefully concealed. They’re still extravagant takes of violent chaos.
Not all of the twists are as clever as they think it is. Often the cinematography leads you to read what’s about to happen long before it does. And many bold choices are made just to be shocking but with no real motivator to the story.
Bushwick won’t end up a theatrical hit after Sundance but when it appears on VOD, people won’t be disappointed. Or maybe like Cooties, directors Cary Murnion and Jonathan Milott will be able to shoot additional footage and make it more awesome, and perhaps even more seamless.
