Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Director: John V. Soto, Defiant Screen Entertainment.
Cast: Jacqueline McKenzie, Myles Pollard, Hayley Mclhinney.
According to Australian writer and director John V. Soto (The Reckoning, Needle), The Gateway was originally intended as a time travel exercise. However, as he felt those types of films had inundated the market, he toned it up a bit by making it a tale about parallel universes – and the trouble they can cause the characters.
John co-wrote the film with British writer, Michael White.
Grieving over the loss of her husband in a car accident, Dr. Jane Chandler (McKenzie) travels to a parallel world to find him again, but the consequences are dire for her family.
Chandler is a particle physicist working in a small, but highly advanced laboratory. Her experiments in teleportation are about to succeed. As a result, this scientific breakthrough could change the world as we know it. She does not hesitate when it comes to putting things right when tragedy strikes.
McKenzie (Deep Blue Sea, Romper Stomper, Angel Baby) explores the film’s expressive contemplation of sorrow, anxiety and compromised principles with responsibility, affection and perception.
Supporting McKenzie is Myles Pollard (X-Men Origins: Wolverine, McLeod’s Daughters and Looking for Grace) as Matt Chandler. The question then is do parallel worlds exist…and if she can travel there, what will she discover? The leafy suburbs of Perth are the setting for an inter-dimensional, sci-fi, cat-and-mouse game.
The Gateway was selected for several film festivals including Utah’s noted genre festival FilmQuest (2017), the 2018 London and Boston Sci Fi Film Festivals, the 2017 Sydney Sci Fi Festival, and the Austin Revolution Film Festival (2017) – where it won Best Feature Film, Best EFX, the Audience Award for Best Film and John V. Soto won Best Director.
