Its eyes and aspirations eternally bigger than its budget and reach, this British sci-fi film provides the answer to an unlikely question: what if someone remade 2011’s Source Code in a rundown outpost of Wetherspoon’s? Amid reported unrest between neighbouring planets Atopia and Cho-Hacha, mumsy anti-terror agent Alana Toro (Zoe Cunningham) receives orders from a hologrammatic James Cosmo to track down and bring in a troublesome rebel group. Her mission stalls, however, when she walks into a bar for interstellar truckers, where the film’s horizons shrink and – thanks to a time-loop device – our heroine gets several goes at interrogating the same skeleton crew of patrons and trying to resolve a convoluted and stubbornly uninvolving murder mystery.
Along the way, flickers of B-movie ingenuity and invention catch the eye. The grimy, greasy set design (courtesy of Jamie Foote) conceals some of the budgetary limitations, meaning that this is a rare modern sci-fi that inhabits a palpably physical, non-pixellated space. Costume designer Ciéranne Kennedy Bell clearly had immense fun dressing this troupe in the sort of cyberpunk finery that is a crossover between Red Dwarf and Claire’s Accessories. The score, by Christoph Allerstorfer and James Griffiths, is that of a far more expansive and assured production. Alana herself is a promising pulp creation – a leather-clad, purple-wigged Miss Marple who gets to pull out a space blaster every now and again – even if Cunningham, with her air of a school secretary who’s just uncovered a tuck shop scam, seems more than faintly miscast.
The problems that torpedo the film are evident – and it’s not just the title, with its unfortunate intestinal ring. The setup entails a lot of deeply clunky expositional dialogue and the time-loop conceit just doesn’t work. It is all reliant on a repeated PA announcement that reaches “see it, say it, sorted” levels of annoyance, and a wristwatch that keeps having to spell out what the direction doesn’t always make clear. A very British vision of the future, all told: cramped, impoverished and something of a drag.
• Voidance is on digital platforms from 25 May.
