It’s no secret that many films use a gimmick to help them sell tickets. From 3D to DBox and more, gimmicks are meant to draw people into a theatre. In some cases the movie transcends the gimmick, such as Avatar which has perhaps the best 3D effects ever seen in a film. But in many cases the gimmick is the only thing people remember. Writer/director Sean Perry does something a little different for his new film Dash however. This makes his movie more than just a gimmick. The entire film is shot from the dash cam of a car, with one take and zero cuts. And it takes you on one hell of a ride.

Milly (Alexander Molina) is the driver for a rideshare company, who tends to make very bad decisions. One such decision is sleeping around on his wife. He impregnates his mistress without telling her that he has a wife already.  Instead he decides to live a double life and sell cocaine to his customers to help pay for the baby’s arrival. When one customer dies in his car after taking his drugs Milly panics and his life spirals even further out of control. And it leads to consequences he prefers not to face.

Dash is an intense film. It starts slowly, with Milly picking up various customers along the way, but when it speeds up it catches you in its web and you will watch it to the end. Milly is a completely deplorable character, but you want to see what happens next and how it all ends up. Molina does such a great job that you can feel the anxiety the character is feeling and because of that the intensity can be overwhelming.

Without Molina’s strong performance, Dash simply wouldn’t have been as good as it turned out. The way it tells the story through the one dash cam, and various screen shots of the text messaging that goes on, is a unique way to tell a story. And it adds to the over all feel of the film. It even makes you feel more than a little awkward and claustrophobic at times. It also brings back memories of the tension we’ve all felt while travelling in a cab or rideshare vehicle.

Dash is interesting and memorable, and thankfully the gimmick doesn’t overstay its welcome. If Perry continues to think outside the box with his creations he will have a bright future ahead of him.