Two Americans end up in Dakar, Senegal, with bombs strapped to their chests and ten hours to find out why.
Director Jean-Luc Herbulot is a hero in my mind. His film “Saloum” premiered in festivals all across the globe with a slick blend of African mythology, old westerns, and horror packaged neatly with tight visuals and expansive audio. The film demonstrates a penchant for fun and interesting ideas and the know-how and determination to see those ideas through. His determination carries so far that he has expanded his efforts to make movies in his home and started developing a production company that could very well grow into a studio in its own right. “Zero” is his first film out of this new drive, and in a great many ways, it delivers on all the same ideas as “Saloum,” only this time with a name-brand narrator or two.
The film follows two American tourists with bombs strapped to their chests, forced to do the errands of a mysterious voice in their ear. The two run errands around Dakar fighting gangsters, delivering goats, and cutting cocaine with children as bombs go off all around the city. The Banker (Hus Miller) returned to Dakar to reconnect with his long lost daughter, meanwhile, The Brawler (Cam McHarg) was on his way to freedom after a million dollar bank heist. Both wake up in Dakar and have to follow the instructions: pick up a watch, deliver the watch to child soldiers, take the mysterious box to an Imam, deliver the Imam’s son a goat, and attend the Imam’s son’s wedding. All the while, bombs go off in the city, inciting panic and chaos across Dakar.
A literal ticking time bomb keeps this movie on track, and while it might share values with other nonstop action films like the “Crank” series, it definitely stops to let its characters breathe. Hus Miller and Cam McHarg play their roles perfectly, with one constantly chickening out and the other always stepping up to the plate. #1, the Banker, pushes back on the voice. His questions reflect the audience’s desire to know more, and when he finally gets onboard, the whole movie really starts to take off. All the while, #2, the Brawler, goes with the flow. He intuits the criminal activity much more than #1 and guides them through some gnarlier sequences, but don’t worry, the skills of both men are necessary to complete the task. Their opposing personalities play so well against each other and lighten the mood even when every other scene reminds us of the dangers of a vest full of Semtex.
Atop it all is Willem Dafoe’s lone voice, monitoring our two protagonists. He chuckles, scolds, and cajoles them with that infamous vocal fry of his, the dark rumbles of his bass register to almost soothe our ears. Dafoe never gets to cackle, but just hearing him say words reminds us how much of a performance he can give, and here he’s relegated to lines. That’s not a criticism on my end. Including a significant Hollywood talent in this budget of an action film demonstrates an understanding of how to best use that talent and keep their involvement nominal while having them permeate the entire film. Plenty of low-budget action movies incorporate famous actors as early one-offs or distant bad guys (look at the long careers of actors like Gary Oldman, Sam Neill, Bruce Willis, and even Mel Gibson). They’re cameos designed to improve the film’s awareness and provide easy paychecks for the actors, but they rarely participate in more than a scene or two. “Zero” gets to have its cake and eat it too with Dafoe’s voice-over, even if his audio sounds less like it’s coming over the phone and more like its being fed straight into the mic. Still, every choice in this film feels intentional, and if they removed any EQing on Dafoe’s lines, it might be because that was a better choice, and that’s what I love most about this movie and its director’s career: He knows how to make choices.
“Zero” works so well because it utilizes all of the tools at a filmmaker’s disposal to conjure up the action it purports to us. Not every explosion is onscreen. Fight sequences get their longer takes, given that there’s room to highlight that. Our two leads spend plenty of time skulking and hiding from the cops rather than suffer a chase scene every time. When the film needs to winnow down to austere locations and simple sets, it does so intelligently. The locations always feel authentic, and the camera work helps establish some of these places with a serious tone that allows the viewer to buy into every moment and every beat. In my mind, the best filmmakers are the ones who take constraints like budgets or time and turn those into tools rather than obstacles. If pressure makes diamonds then Jean Luc Herbulot is making impressively crafted jewelry. So much so that I’d be curious to see what kind of studio picture would get him.
Herbulot has an eye for boots-on-the-ground filmmaking. “Zero” uses a wobbling camera when necessary and returns to more conventional framing for the softer scenes. Most importantly, the film utilizes a drone shot, complete with frame zooms and graphic overlays, to transition from scene to scene. They’re not drone shots for action’s sake but as chapter markers, almost, and Herbulot not only uses them that way but also girds them with impressively crafted graphics to sell the vision overall.
If you are scrolling through any streaming service and are unsure what to watch, “Saloum” is a wild ride, and “Zero” fits the bill. Our protagonists in “Zero” don’t get the same deeper character motivation as the ones in “Saloum,” but I would argue they’re not as necessary. By the time the movie gives you an idea of the end game, Herbulot shows the world much grander than it started. The dots finally connect, and the errands quickly change from silly to sinister. “Zero” is a movie that knows how to throw its punches, and I continue to be excited about director Herbulot’s work as he makes it to the big screen.
“Zero” recently had its World Premiere on September 30th at Beyond Fest XII