SXSW 2024 Review: DEAD MAIL, Lo-Fi Retro Thriller Excites In Form And Function

When a mysterious bloody plea for help ends up in the dead letter office of a rural post office, the inspector on site becomes determined to find its origin, leading him down a deadly road in writer/directors Joe DeBoer and Kyle McConaghy’s new lo-fi thriller Dead Mail.

Opening with a desperate man crawling toward the postal box with a hastily scribbled, somewhat vague note covered in blood in what appears to be a last-ditch effort to free himself and quickly circling back on itself, there’s nothing common or expected about Dead Mail.

The message makes its way through chatty long-timers Ann (Micki Jackson) and Bess (Susan Priver) in the sorting room en route to missing mail guru, Jasper (Tomas Boykin). Jasper has a knack for solving postal mysteries, if it lands on his desk, no matter how little information he has, he will help it find its way home with a little help from Renee (Nick Heyman), a stealthy computer hacker on the other side of the world. The deeper he digs, the more danger he is in, as the object of this note is more dangerous – and closer – than he could imagine.

This is where Dead Mail takes a hard left turn, taking us back in time to the origin of this crisis to its unlikely beginning in a regional synthesizer trade show in the middle of nowhere Illinois. Josh, (Sterling Macer, Jr.) is a nerdy programmer showing off his latest creation to little effect among the shoppers, that is until Trent (John Fleck) shows up. Impressed by what he hears, Trent invites Josh to partner up with him on creating a perfect synthesizer whose sounds will be indistinguishable from the real-life instruments it emulates.

Josh accepts, and while the partnership of patron and artist seems to be going swimmingly at first, things soon turn sinister when Josh receives a lucrative offer to work at a prestigious electronics firm. Trent is not one to let go of perfection, and so begins the struggle between the two men, with Josh now a captive as he attempts to craft the perfect synth.

Set in some nebulous time and place in middle America between the late seventies and the beginning of the ‘90s, Dead Mail is all about obsession to detail, which fits nicely with the filmmakers work in creating a facsimile of this very beige time in American history. From the very first frame, the film seems to be paying homage to the great low budget thrillers and horrors of the past. Opening on a scene that mimics Sally’s attempted escape in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) both in terms of action as well as aesthetics, Dead Mail wants to transport us to a time when the world was dangerous because of how disconnected it was.

Through modern wizardry Dead Mail is able to achieve a pretty authentically gritty, grainy look that definitely recalls those run-and-gun indie horrors of the ‘70s like Chain Saw, but that’s not where the commitment to aesthetic ends. The film also utilizes a dreamy, unsettling score of synths crafted by Janet Beat that is a mix of affecting mood pieces and austere beeps and boops that keeps the audience slightly off kilter throughout the film. It’s an excellent mix of form and content that creates a truly immersive experience in which the viewer can easily lose themselves, the reality of the film seems heightened, but only just, so that we can still find ourselves within the story.

The film is structurally fascinating as it begins in the middle of the story, and there are early points at which we believe that we are witnessing the main plot unfold, but it all overlaps with itself in a most ingenious way. Holding down the film’s most dramatic moments are incredible performances from Macer, Jr. as Josh and Fleck as his demanding benefactor, Trent. These two play the role of master and unwitting servant with a great natural flow. The characters themselves are archetypical, but they feel real in the context of the film, further drawing the viewer in to this bizarrely obsessive world.

Dead Mail is one of the most fascinating films at this year’s SXSW, and certainly among the most exciting in the Visions strand, which aims to shed a light on challenging and experimental work. While it’s not strictly speaking a horror film, there is plenty to suggest that fans of the genre will enjoy the film with all of its allusions to grindhouse era exploitation aesthetics, even if it lacks the blood and gore.

A film where style is equal to substance and where both work in this kind of harmony is rare, but Dead Mail is just such an animal. Unusual in its tone and execution, but familiar enough to evoke nostalgia for nightmares of days gone by, Dead Mail is a remarkable example of the possibilities that exist for modern independent cinema, they are endless.