‘Sleight’ Is A Must-See Thriller About A Street Magician [Sundance Review]
“Anyone can learn a trick, but doing something nobody else can do makes you a magician.”
The story follows a young street magician named Bo (The Maze Runner’s Jacob Latimore) who is taking care of his little sister Tina (12 Years a Slave’s Storm Reid) following the death of their mother. Performing magic on the streets for tourists isn’t enough to pay the bills, so Bo has turned to peddling drugs at clubs and parties for a local drug dealer Angelo (Psych and West Wing’s Dulé Hill). Making clever use of his sleight of hand skills, Bo is able to avoid trouble from the police.
When another dealer tries to take over the Los Angeles market, Bo is propelled into a world of guns and gang violence, definitely not the “selling dime bags to club-goers” job he signed up for. Along the way, Bo falls for a girl named Holly (Seychelles Gabriel, a stand-out from the television series Falling Skies). And of course, quitting the drug business isn’t as easy as it sounds — the film transitions from a moretypical indie drama into a comic book origin story disguised inside a thriller. How will Bo use his magic skills to get out of this situation?
Dillard is a refreshing new filmmaker who is certainly one to watch. This may be his first feature film, but Dillard has directed some music videos and is also developing a film project for Bad Robot and Paramount Pictures (the details on this project are unknown). When I saw Safety Not Guaranteed at Sundance a few years back, I knew that Colin Trevorrow was about to be tapped for much bigger films (but even I wouldn’t have predicted Star Wars and Jurassic Park sequels). I think its easy to see Dillard will probably also capture the attention of Hollywood genre films — I could definitely see him at the helm of a future Marvel movie. Read more…… http://www.slashfilm.com/sleight-movie-review/