Little Girl Lost: Entrance (2012)

I love Los Angeles. Born and raised and couldn’t really imagine living anywhere else. The city I see through my eyes is one of neighborhoods and families, artists and film makers, the people who grow up here and those who move here through their careers. But what about the others, the people that move here to make things happen but get lost in the shuffle? The lonely ones that you meet but never really acknowledge. What happens to them? That is what we see in the film “Entrance”.  

Entrance is a slow burn. I don’t mean Ti West slow. I mean snail crawl. The films climax is ugly and terrifying in its plausibility, but getting there depends on ones expectations.

Suziey Block is Suzy, a young girl who has moved to the big city and is trying to find her way. She works as a Barista and pretty much has no solid relationships besides her dog Daryl. Like many people, she has a small circle of acquaintances but no real friends. Some of this seems to be of her own doing, too paranoid and distrusting to invite anyone into her life. A little girl lost in the big city.

She seems to be heading for a bad patch at the start of the film. Her car has just broken down and she has no money to fix it again. Without any means of transportation she slips further into a state of routine. She wakes, makes coffee, feeds Daryl, does her make-up, goes to work and comes home to sleep. Seven days a week. Because her life is so routine, she is easy to watch, and someone is watching her. 

Then a series of events changes things for her and she finds herself truly alone. Dying inside, she decides to move home and that’s when things spiral towards true terror.

This is not a film for everybody. It is slow and uneventful for most of its running time but that is the point. Dallas Hallam and Patrick Horvath are bringing you into Suzy’s world. The pacing is deliberate in that you find yourself lost in the seemingly endless routine of a faceless cog in the Los Angeles machine. You find yourself trapped with no end in sight and then, just when you decide to make a change, a change is made for you, and all you can do is become a voyeur in a life that isn’t really much.

I can’t say much more because so little happens in the hour before the shit hits the fan. It is a film that should be watched. I can see this film scaring many young single girls from out of town and having others roll their eyes with disbelief. I can tell you from experience. My city will eat you alive if you let it. You need relationships, experiences and most of all, you can’t be afraid. The city will smell it on you like a hungry wolf and it will pounce.

Part horror, part character study, and part cautionary tale, Entrance is film worth watching and more importantly, worth pondering. Los Angeles is something different to every outsider that comes here. Come here open or something might just feel it needs to force its way in. And for those of you that live in a big city, next time you see someone walking down the street, smile, say hello. You never know, you just might be saving a lost soul.