A dystopian drama set in a future where mass incarceration has led to prisons becoming online entertainment portals where viewers decide what the felons eat, wear and read, as well as when they fight.

Is it just me, or do all of these dystopian movies lately not seem even a little far and away from reality anymore? S.A. Halewood wrote and directed, Division 19, an anti-establishment political thriller set in 2039 about a money-over-masses society where everyone is microchipped, prisoners are used for entertainment and profit, and a fringe society of rebels, known as Division 19, lives off of the government’s 24/7 surveillance grid.

Division 19 opens with a member of the resistance, Barca (Toby Hemingway), chastising us for a number of things – using smartphones while the world burns, playing the victim, being lazy, fearful, and so on. It is a rallying call, as society has slipped further into the hands of government control and corporate dependence since the recession. Anonymity is a crime and everyone must be registered – the upside is that you can earn community action points for obeying government orders. As a way to quell the masses, citizens are offered the opportunity to subscribe to Panopticon TV, a popular 24/7 live-feed to inmates and prison fights, where they are able to decide what their adopted felon wears, eats, and who they fight. This division of the penal system is headed by Alexandra Nielsen (Alison Doody), who has raised consumerism by using popular inmates to boost advertising and sales, with her most popular gladiator being Hardin Jones (Jamie Draven). Her next idea, a new subscription service where citizens can watch inmates “reintroduced” back into society via a fake city, dubbed New Town, pushes the resistance, headed by Hardin’s little brother, Nash (Will Rothhaar), to launch a prison break for Hardin and cripple the system. The resistance hopes Hardin will be a catalyst, and his release sets in motion the release of their manifesto – investigate the failures of the government, lest they hack and then empty the national banks. When the government calls their bluff, what ensues is a tug of war between them and the resistance group for Hardin, all captured on live TV. As the network’s advertisements bellow over and over: Drama has never been so real.

As a cyberpunk sci-fi thriller with notes of even westerns towards the end, Division 19 certainly looks stylish, and from the dialogue, it is obvious that S.A. Halewood has a voice and view on the modern world. The potential was definitely there, though, for me, Division 19 is missing something to make it memorable and does not have any characters to pull me fully into the narrative – I found myself tuning out quite a bit, which is unfortunate since this is the kind of movie you should probably watch twice to catch everything. There is corporate overreach, the prison industrial complex, mental illness for humans and even AI helper-bots, crumbling infrastructure, poverty and unemployment, the loss of anonymity and privacy, and so many other topics within the narrative, but within the parameters of Division 19’s budget and runtime these juicy morsels of relevant subject matter are unfortunately only lightly grazed upon when the cold-opening rant about my apparent sheep-ness set me up to feast. Did you see the 2009 movie Gamer? Maybe you didn’t since it was generally ill-received critically, but I personally loved it for its daring subject matter (also about corporate overreach into the prison industrial complex where citizens control inmates, hmm) and also loved it for the opp to see Hollywood’s resident calm villain, Michael C Hall, baddie it up – Division 19 felt like it had the serious tone that critics were wanting to see in Gamer, which took humourous artistic liberties, however Gamer had a more successful deep dive into its social commentary and better showed how precariously close our current society is to getting there. Division 19 had a nice look to it, but with the lack of action and missed opportunity for compelling parallel building, if you’re looking for a political thriller that’s heavy on power/control themes then I would actually recommend Gamer.

Division 19 reportedly had a budget of $2 million and its digital effects budget was put to use to make okay looking robots as well as pretty good looking floating surveillance cameras that are equipped with heavy firepower. I could have done without the artificial intelligence aspect (again, too many subjects not given proper attention) and the money spent on it, I was more so surprised that there was not really that much action, and frankly the robot budget could have instead been used to up the ante with pyrotechnics or something during these rebels vs. law enforcement scenes, instead of just a bunch of parkouring. I did, however, like getting to see the decay of present-day Detroit that was used to portray that infrastructure problem a little better though, thanks to all that parkouring. In addition to Detroit as well as New York, director S.A. Halewood also shot and completed in London in 2017, where it is has since picked up Critics’ Awards (2017 Fantasporto) and a Feature Film Award (2018 Boston Science Fiction Film Festival) thanks to her vivid tech-aesthetic and imaginative storytelling.

Though you may be expecting to see mega-copters chasing down rebels per the exciting poster, Division 19 will be worth a watch only if you would appreciate a slower paced sci-fi thriller. For your effort, you will at least be treated to pretty good performances from its ensemble cast and a budding auteur in its director, S.A. Halewood. Division 19 will be released by its production company, Uncork’d Entertainment, both in theaters and on demand starting April 5, 2019.