After a mysterious illness wipes out the world’s adult population, a group of young people tries to keep their community civilized by erasing what they consider the mistakes of the previous society with their new rules. A young man named Josh, seeing that the group in charge of the order is also the one who tends to commit abuses against the weakest of their people, feels the need to explore the grounds that are beyond what is considered «safe» to the north of his community, convinced that there may be something better than the place where he lives.

After his only friend gets expelled from the community for breaking the rules, Josh decides to take a chance and run away, joined by Jessie, the leader’s younger sister. This escape is  considered by the group in charge as a risk to the community’s  stability and decide to chase the couple and bring them back by any means necessary.

“Go North” is a coming-of-age story that just happens to take place in a post apocalyptic world, but does not resort to the popular genre of zombies or infected, nor its cliches, it rather tries to evoke works like «Lord of the flies» where when the adult’s authority figure is gone, the same young people who seek to create a new order, tend to succumb to abuse of power, and where individuals who try to open their own path become a threat to the system, all this mixed with a bit of youth drama and romance … Nothing wrong with that, by the way.

Without trying to be preachy or pretentious, “Go North” has simple premise, narrated at a good steady pace, however, it is not a movie that I can recommend to just anyone, since is not filled with a lot of action, nor violence or gore, if you decide to give this film a try, expect something more on the lines of a drama. It is worth mentioning that while there are details that are more appreciated on a second view, it leaves unanswered some questions that can not be considered as irrelevant … I will not go into details in order to avoid spoilers, but I think you will know what I mean when your see them.

On the other hand, I do recommend this film to aspiring filmmakers since I think it could be  a very useful example of how a film without a big budget can look great. There were angles used at several points of the film that helped the story to move faster and made us feel that we are watching a bigger world that the one (I can only assume) was actually used also with the help of good editing, even when at times the shots where used in that «drunken camera» style that I don’t particular like.

The film was directed by Matthew Ogens known for documentaries like “Confessions of a Superhero” with a script co-written with Kyle Lierman (Queen Of The South). The movie also has a musical score that I liked and felt very appropriate in several scenes composed by Greg Kuehn. I thought the acting was solid, with performances of Jacob Loflan (Mud), Sophie Kennedy Clark (Nymphomaniac vol 1 y 2, Black Mirror) Patrick Schwarzenegger (Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse) and James Bloor in the cast.

“Go North” will be released on select U.S. theaters and VOD  on Friday January 13th, 2017 distributed by Gunpowder & Sky.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiC2s14hBO8