Meltdown: A Nuclear Family’s Ascent into Madness (2023 | USA | 85 minutes | Colton Van Til)
Ever since Vincent Price dropped acid in the silly but very fun 1959 B-flick The Tingler, bad drug trips have provided fuel for some fascinating genre detours.
Movies utilizing hallucinogens as a plot element run the gamut from consciousness-exploring sci-fi (Altered States) to warped political thrillers run amok (Blue Sunshine), to horror comedies (Get Duked!), to period dramas (A Field in England). The trope lends itself to a rich (if not always subtle) vein of metaphor, encompassing rampant sensationalism, socio-political commentary, deep-seated fear, or any combination of the above depending on the film.
Meltdown: A Nuclear Family’s Ascent into Madness, the sophomore feature directorial effort from former Aberdeen native Colton Van Til, aims to be more than just drug-scare exploitation. And if it doesn’t quite knock it out of the park, it’s still a surprisingly compelling indie drama/thriller boasting some great performances and an assured presence in the director’s chair.
The movie opens in 1950s rural America, where mayoral candidate Norman Richards (William Elsman) is planning on hosting seasoned political rival George Nelson (Eric Hanson) and his family. The tenuous summit meeting between the two prospective lawmakers and their respective families is unceremoniously thrown into chaos—and worse—when the entire group is dosed with LSD. Soon, underlying tensions and some very unseemly skeletons in a couple of closets come into play, culminating in a night of bad trips and revelations that swing from uncomfortable to horrific.
Don’t let the rather lurid title, and the equally lurid synopsis above, throw you off. Meltdown unfolds with a fair amount of restraint, taking its time to craft a near-idyllic 1950s suburban setting that feels unforced and resplendent with the gentle headiness of a southern summer. Van Til and cinematographer Thomas George are aided in constructing the evocative surface by composer Jamal Green’s nimble score.
Van Til’s work is bolstered enormously by an ensemble cast that hits the mark. As Norman’s and George’s respective spouses, Hannah Beck and Celena Rae depict ‘50s-shiny-happy-housewives to the point of caricature, until their altered states open their eyes to the weight of patriarchy, and some genuine layers surface. Elsman and Hanson contrast that with solid interpretations of two men who aren’t nearly as far afield from each other as they’d like to think, despite their differing views. David Wendell Boykins turns in great work as a persistent reporter who’s interesting enough to follow in his own right. Anachronistic haircut aside, Finn Roberts radiates considerable charm as Nelson’s son Galen. The jewel of the ensemble just might be Maleah Goldberg, who delivers a natural and emotional turn as Richards’ daughter Joan.
Once the acid kicks in and the characters start to descend into their respective trips, Van Til and George get a lot of mileage out of saturated colors and skewed angles without beating those visual devices to death. Green’s imaginative music responds with shards of atonality, jabs of strange synths, alien percussion, and shifts in speed and distortion (a faithful cover of that ‘50s chestnut, “Rockin’ Robin,” gets warped, sped up, and slowed down to great, disorienting effect here).
Van Til and team have assembled a movie that shows admirable tact in its portrayal of encroaching drug psychosis, favoring characterization and human drama over cheap tawdriness. At times, the approach feels a little too polite—Sometimes Meltdown’s bad-trip energy doesn’t quite feel delirious or dangerous enough. And while the screenplay by Van Til, Ashley Tropea, and co-producer Sophia Hoefle touches on a lot of great ideas—hallucinogens as philosophical/social liberation, the pernicious and multi-tentacled nature of patriarchy, the loss of innocence looming just around the corner with the onset of the ‘60s and the counterculture—not all of them are fully-realized.
Then again, threading those symbolic needles would make for a much longer movie. And Van Til and company construct the movie’s most prominent skeleton in the closet with considerable tension, snap, and impact. Meltdown may not be quite as unhinged as its title promises, but it still works as an effective period piece peopled with well-realized characters, and as a compact thriller with a central mystery well worth following to the end. It’ll play great on a big screen.
(Meltdown: A Nuclear Family’s Ascent into Madness plays August 14–16 at Seattle’s Admiral Theater, and at the Historic Lynwood Theater on Bainbridge Island. Tickets available here.)
