Track 16 (2000)

Posted on Sep 12, 2001 under Action-suspense |

Produced, written, and directed by Mick McCleery
Starring
- Billy Franks
- Bobbi Ashton
- Mick McCleery
- C Fox C
- Alan Pratt

When Mick McCleery followed up to make sure his screener got to me, he mentioned in passing that the DVD version was in the works, so any great quotes I had would have a chance at showing up on the liner. That’s if I liked it, of course.

Well, I did and do like it,and I’ve got a quote ready-made for the DVD sleeve:

“Not only does Track 16 have an intriguing premise; not only does Track 16 have a kick-ass soundtrack; but the kick-ass soundtrack is integral to the intriguing premise.”

Howzat, Mick?

The things some people will do for an audition…

Gotta tell you, though, I started off with misgivings. Playing under the opening credits is some pseudo-documentary footage, such as you’d see on your local university’s learning channel, explaining the evolution of multi-track recording from the earliest magnetophone recorders of sixty years ago to today’s 16-track standard. Necessary background information, yes, especially for those of us without much experience in that department, but woefully inappropriate in mood for the flick.

And the first scene deepens those misgivings; it’s a series of long single takes in a basement recording studio, which prevents the scene from being clearly miked — and the fact that the main character has a thick British accent makes comprehension of dialogue even spottier. I groaned.

And then the music kicks in.

See, said main character is Paul Matthews (Billy Franks), lead for the Paul Matthews Network. And Billy Franks is an actual working musician, who wrote and performed all the tracks that appear here as the PMN’s handiwork. And I absolutely loved it. It’s got an honest-homegrown rock feeling to it, unafraid to be serious and yet have fun. All with that non-overproduced, un-signed vibe going for it. Double thanks to Mick for including a soundtrack CD along with the screener; it’s now a cherished possession.

I’m betting that PepsiCo Inc. did not pay a promotional fee to appear in this scene.

Anyway. It’s the end of a late-nite recording session, and everybody’s pooped, but Paul sends the rest of the band out to go home or barhopping or whatever while he records a couple of extra vocal tracks. He records it four times, taking his time in getting it right (and kudos to McCleery for managing to shoot this scene in such a way that it doesn’t wear out its welcome), then goes back to listen to the tracks again and mull them over. And at the very end — at the end of track 16 — he hears something muffled. Something that sounds like a scream just outside the studio.

And when he goes out into the hallway, he discovers a bloody blonde body.

Naturally, the police treat him as the prime suspect, since he manages to get his bloody fingerprints all over everything; the black and white detective partners who grill him into the wee small hours (C Fox C and Alan Pratt, respectively) seem determined to make the crime stick to the first person to walk into their net, even if they can’t keep straight who’s playing what part in “good cop/bad cop.” And the delay in time between the death and the reporting of the scream leaves them doubly suspicious.

“You don’t think we look like a couple of cops here at this nightclub, do you?”

And then there’s the policewoman at the scene (Bobbi Ashton) who knew the dead girl — in fact, the two of them used to frequent the bar where the Paul Matthews Network plays regularly. So she takes it upon herself to do some off-the-record investigating of her own.

And then there’s the real killer. Because he’s still out there. And you know these guys never strike just once.

I was very pleasantly surprised by the technical acumen of this feature. Sure, there are times when the microbudget makes itself known forcefully, usually in scenes of poor lighting or shaky camera work. But such instances are surprisingly rare; other scenes are striking in their creative editing and composition, and the uniformly good acting helps immensely. Here are some of my faves:

Hey, when you’ve got a limited costume budget, you gotta go with what you can get.

- Paul talks to himself, both in dreams and waking, by seeing two other iterations of himself in the room, taking up a patter mirroring that of the detective partners. Not only is this novel (and amusing, when the two imaginary Pauls gang up on the real one), but it’s also seamlessly edited in every instance.

- Policewoman Fallon invites Paul back to her place, but then sends him out to the liquor store for some wine. Why? So she can (in a frenetically edited sequence) clean up all the obvious cop stuff all over the apartment: hats, certificates, guns, uniforms, bulletproof vests… Mind you, Paul has already figured out she’s a cop by this point, but she doesn’t know that, does she?

Through it all, the music lends wonderful atmosphere, and McCleery does an incredible job of building scenes around full four-minute songs without making the movie look like a strung-together series of music videos.

Naturally, there are some weak spots; there’s a long series of scenes intercut with Paul’s recording session of Mason (the most prominent member of the band, played by McCleery) and the other band members barhopping and basically shooting the breeze. While the import of these scenes is revealed later, at the time they seem more like ballast and filler. Like the docu-footage at the beginning, they’re necessary for what comes after, but they don’t move the story along while they’re being presented. And there’s also a limit to how long a sex scene can last while studiously avoiding the exhibition of the leading lady’s breasts.

“Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my cl– oh wait, I’m the director.”

But somehow, McCleery manages to confine all the flaws to the first half hour. The rest of the movie avoids false steps in its quest to turn up the tension.

Perhaps the greatest compliment was paid by my wife. Normally she’s content to go to bed or balance the checkbook or something while I’m watching whatever-the-hell in the other room. This time, she kept drifting in to glance at the screen, intrigued by the music; she finally sat down and watched the last fifteen minutes with me, captivated. She even sat without flinching through a scene in which the characters drop the F-bomb so often you’d think there was a twice-per-sentence minimum.

So. Mick, anything other quotes in here you think are useful, you go ahead and grab them. I’m happy to have seen this one, and I’m happy to encourage others to see it.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to dub a tape of the soundtrack CD to put permanently in the car.