GFF 2024: Jericho Ridge

Jericho Ridge stars Nikki Amuka-Bird as Tabby Temple, a small-town cop who winds up manning a police station in the middle of nowhere with only her delinquent son Monty (Zack Morris) for company. What looks like another dull night on the job turns into a desperate struggle for survival when a group of cartel killers lay siege to the station. They’ve got the numerical advantage and an arsenal of high-powered rifles; she’s got one good leg and a revolver with the wrong-sized bullets jammed inside. And yet...

Anchored by its steely central performance, Will Gilbey’s debut feature is a tight, punchy one-location thriller. It continually finds inventive ways to mix up the action and there’s a kinetic quality to the gunfights, each shot ripping through the air with catastrophic power.

Later on, Tabby delivers a dramatic monologue that tells us a little more about the life she’ll be returning to if she makes it out alive. It’s well acted but also unnecessary – Amuka-Bird’s performance is already doing so much to tell us who Tabby is that we don’t need it spelled out. The speech also adds a domestic abuse element to the story which a cooped-up action flick like this doesn’t really have the space to deal with, almost like it's ticking an imaginary 'female action hero' box rather than just letting Amuka-Bird get her John McClane on. She’s riveting, and the film is at its strongest when it just lets her cook.

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Jericho Ridge has its UK premiere at Glasgow Film Festival on 9 Mar and is released 25 Apr by Strike Media