Unspeakable

This dark thriller, set in Cleveland and northeast Ohio, was written and directed by Cleveland native, Marquette Williams. Williams and his production company, Cinema 2:16, are on a mission to promote the local production of diverse, high-quality films. They're spot-on with UNSPEAKABLE, the story of a masked man seeking answers. Holding a suburban family hostage, he frightens them into revealing much about their own dark secrets. When we meet them at first, Sam and Doris Hickle seem to have rather odd personalities, but they and their two foster children, Jeffrey and Anne, lead apparently innocuous lives. Young Jeffrey wishes he could see more of his social worker, so he sends him an e-mail. Not long after the case worker arrives for a visit, though, things start to unravel. Soon the Hickles are taken captive by someone looking for Doris's brother. As scenes of their capture intertwine with the unimaginable stories that led the characters up to this point, UNSPEAKABLE illuminates some of the unspeakably vile corners of the human soul. Shot using high definition digital film and edited in Los Angeles, the film has a unique, jarring visual style that underscores its unsettling subject matter. – BB