The performers certainly aren’t to blame. Sheridan makes the most of his character’s limited ability to express himself emotionally, providing subtle shadings that make Bart sympathetic despite his social and moral missteps. De Armas is warmly appealing as the potential love interest, and Helen Hunt makes a strong impression as Bart’s mother, who will do anything to protect her „fragile“ son who spends most of his time in the basement. Unfortunately, their commendable efforts aren’t enough to compensate for the film’s tonal and narrative inconsistencies.
A young autistic man (Tye Sheridan) witnesses a murder at his hotel job in this indie noir from director/writer Michael Cristofer (whom you may know as CEO Phillip Price in “Mr. Robot”). The twist? He sees it because he’s installed cameras in the guests’ rooms so he can observe “normal” human behavior, which makes him less than an innocent bystander.
Sheridan’s character, Bart, works the night shift, and has taken to studying the people who check in, in order to observe and learn from their conversations and the way they navigate social situations and even just being alone in their rooms. After his shifts, he replays the footage, parroting segments of dialogue. But his glaring ethical transgression is eclipsed when he sees a female guest killed by a visitor to her room — and then meets another young woman (Ana de Armas) who’s in a relationship with the killer.
The plot turns on an implausible level of coincidence and a bunch of perplexing decisions by characters, though Sheridan’s dedicated performance keeps you watching (de Armas, by contrast, seems to exist mostly to fuel Bart’s dream of being able to interact with women). John Leguizamo rather phones in a role as a disheveled cop investigating the case, and Helen Hunt is Bart’s understandably worried mother, with little to do other than be worried.