FrightFest review – Cover (2025)
This is one of my favourite films at this year’s FrightFest, but works best if you know little about it going in – so I’ll be tactful.
Trevor (writer-director Cameron Francis) is a middle-aged stamp dealer, may have got his hands on several extremely valuable ‘covers’ (stamped, signed envelopes with particular significance – in this case, literally out of this world) or may have simply sprung for some exceptionally convincing forgeries. He is travelling to a rendezvous with a mysterious client in order to fill his bank account with enough funds to cover (that must be a deliberate play on words) a cheque he has already written but hasn’t delivered to its recipient. Trevor plays his cards close to his chest and is observant, paranoid, clever and slyly witty – useful qualities in his current profession, but carried over from a previous occupation. He’s also a noir icon – a lonely man in a car, bent on a shady task with obsessive precision. His world is shaken up by Macy (Katherine Lozon), a woman fleeing an abusive boyfriend, whose first attempt to talk her way into his car and confidence fizzles because he spots ellipses in her story – she walks past a table of women who offer their help to a distressed sister in a diner in order to home in on ‘a potential creep’. Even when she has plausible reasons for everything, her story doesn’t quite add up … but then again, neither does his.
Cover is a road movie, with stops along the way for an escalating of odd incidents … and Trevor suspects they are being pursued by an ominous white pick-up truck, but is its driver connected with his backstory, hers or the both of them? Francis doubles back at one point to explain some things away while opening up other mysteries, and some emotional heft is given to the trickiness when the taciturn protagonist opens up and talks about a past trauma (which features another meaning for the word ‘cover’ as in ‘take cover’). This is Francis’ first feature – after a clutch of shorts – and depends a lot on his own performance and that of the unfamiliar Lozon. Garin Jones is also good as a significant side-player in the two-for-the-road drama. It’s such a strong script I’m sure Francis could have sold it and seen it become a conventional feature with name actors, but he’s taken the tougher road and made it himself. It’s suspenseful, funny, moving, surprising and intelligent. Highly recommended.
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