Day 302: Vanishing on 7th Street

This was definitely a Netflix watch because I had such high hopes for Brad Anderson. After he made Session 9 and The Machinist, I figured he was on his way to another David Fincher style career. But then he made this.

Vanishing on 7th Street is about a small group of people who wake up one day to find everyone else on Earth is gone. In a giant city, streets are empty and clothes are everywhere. Hayden Christensen goes to look for his fiance and only finds more evidence that everyone vanished in moments of darkness. There seem to be shadow people everywhere but they can't interact with the survivors. Slowly, a group gathers at a bar where the generator is running to keep the lights on. Each person has their own agenda for finding missing loved ones and staying alive. Every time the lights go out or blink, another person disappears.

I should have set my bar pretty low when I saw Hayden Christensen and John Leguizamo were the stars of this. Thandie Newton being in it helps a little but her character is pretty one note. Most of them are. The ensemble don't imbue their characters with a rich inner life that makes you worry they will be sucked in by the shadows. They just show up, do some stuff and vanish one by one. The whole thing is a pretty big letdown to me even though it has the same premise as a story I wrote in middle school.

Don't waste your time with this vanishing.