5150 starts with a bang. The film opens on an ominous scene of a dancing ballerina as police reports about a psychotic woman having a breakdown play in the background. It then cuts to Autumn (Ashlyn Pearce) as she enters a dark apartment, making her way through the space to an area illuminated candlelight where she finds her sister, Cami (Kirby Johnson), suffering from all sorts of paranoid delusions, something that seems to happen regularly judging from the reports and their interaction. Out of options, Autumn agrees to have Cami deemed mentally unfit and has her confined to a treatment facility. The film picks up 2 years later, with Autumn and her friends Carmen (Daffany McGaray Clark) and Desiree (Vanessa Giordano) all receiving notes left by Cami that she wants to meet with them and make amends. This is where we learn these are terrible people. I guess this is as good a time as any to get into these characters: Desiree is having a baby, Carmen is a successful actress, and Autumn has a sister, she’s also a writer, but that doesn’t really factor into the story much until the climax. Every damn word out of these characters mouths is about their one character trait. I guess Desiree has a husband and Autumn and Cami have a dad (men being necessary for making babies) but other than those basic, biological necessities, we learn nothing that would cause us to care about any of them. And on top of that, they’re also terrible people.

Everyone in this film is callous and self-interested. I get the sense that this was the intent, but that doesn’t help the situation. In these 2 years since Cami was committed, apparently no one, including her sister, has attempted to contact her. I initially thought they had just left her to rot at the treatment facility, but we later find out that she was released, but when she didn’t show up when Autumn went to pick her up, apparently, she just took off and never inquired further. They try to justify their apathy by recounting tales about this woman with severe psychological problems wasn’t always a peach to be around, doing drugs and trying to one up another about the things she stole to feed her habit: diamond cufflinks from Desiree, Carmen’s Bluray player, Autumn’s Faberge Egg. Wait, what? Why are we talking about Carmen’s Bluray player when Autumn left her meth-addicted psychotic sister alone with a priceless artifact of the Russian monarchy? I think they just put the Faberge Egg thing in there as a generic rich person item, but damn, hope she at least got a fair amount of meth out of the deal. They eventually agree to meet up with her and once they do, things go poorly and the film wraps up pretty quickly. Not a lot happens here, just lots of planning and character development that does nothing to move the plot forward except it’s not character development because it’s always about the same thing.

As for technical merits, file this one under “Competent, but unambitious.” There’s a basic cable TV movie aesthetic going on here, but I must give them some credit for at least giving us some color over that highly contrasted and desaturated look that is so popular for the indies trying to look expensive. The score stays out of the way most of the time, but creeps in on occasion to mixed results. There’s a reggae-inspired dance track at one point that seems out of place, but the 90s techno track chosen for the film’s climax works surprisingly well. The acting isn’t great, but I hesitate to criticize it too harshly because the writing gives them nothing to do. During the few moments where they aren’t written into a corner and allowed to act they do fine. This is not a horror movie. Despite what Cami’s black eyes on the cover might suggest, there is no supernatural element to this film. This time, the crazy girl is just crazy, no demonic shenanigans. It’s more akin to a very light Lifetime thriller or perhaps one of Tyler Perry’s serious ventures. Outside of the lead actresses there aren’t any notable characters to speak of, and no men at all outside of a character played by the director featured in an abrupt plot line popping up right at the end which almost seems to be baiting a sequel that cannot and should not happen; like a cliffhanger over a kiddie pool filled with cat urine, whatever the future holds for our heroines will certainly be shallow and miserable.