Metacritic reviews

On a beat-by-beat basis, writer-director Matt Palmer’s feature debut skates close to the edge of cliche – only to swerve suddenly in an interesting new direction almost every time.

A brutally effective little thriller which rings welcome changes on hackneyed urbanites-vs-backwoodsfolk templates.

If nothing here is exactly new, it’s the sheer, breathless precision and momentum of Calibre’s assembly that keeps it startling.

Calibre is a thriller, but one that’s rooted in reality rather than the fantastical or absurd; edgy and tragic.

The character dynamics are recognizable in the way they hew to genre conventions. But the details provided in the writing, and by the two leads’ performances, add distinctive details and dimension here. This makes the film’s harrowing action all the more believable.

The smouldering animosity of an impoverished small town towards two outsiders, combined with the contained tension as a precarious alibi collapses, one chance event at a time, means that the film should resonate with audiences looking for effective genre material.

Matt Palmer’s film is an engrossing but unsurprising swirl of self-preservation instincts, grief, panic and terror. It achieves pulse-pounding only once, and rarely strays from the predictable path set for it.