Zak Hilditch crafts a memorable apocalypse short in “Transmission”
With a name like “Transmission” and a decayed world encompassing anything and everything on-screen, you’d naturally expect zombies, right?
Not exactly.
While there isn’t a single one over the 13 minutes of this film, the powerful performances of Angourie Rice and Wayne S. Davies tell a story with much more depth than any flesh-eating ghoul can deliver.
While it’s ironically more “Kramer vs. Kramer” than “Mad Max,” by the time the credits roll, “Transmission” doesn’t feel like a lost cause. Instead, you smirk at its message. You get it. It hits the right spots at all the right times and makes the case that it had strong enough legs to last far longer.
With the world on the brink of destruction, Rice’s character is focused on other things. She’s a kid. Things like the beach, tomfoolery and starfish are important to her. But Dad (Davies) is desperate to prepare his daughter for the worst. Things like fresh water and gas for the car outweigh the frivolous nonsense his daughter is constantly yammering on about. He knows the world is changing and if his daughter isn’t ready for it, it could devour her and him. Brash, determined on his families’ survival and tough, yet loving, Davies is amply solid here and like Rice, make it easy to want to see more of them in the future.
This relationship is what powers the film. In a beautiful way, its simplicity, chilling score and soft, yet surreal shooting tell the story all by itself. Catchy and economical, it wastes little time getting to the plot and although it’s more emotional than you’d expect, there’s plenty of action as well. This combination, in this dose, has little nothing to do with luck- regardless of what Rice and the film’s tagline try to drill into your head.
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports.
Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders.
His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023.
Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief.
Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale.
Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.
Zak Hilditch crafts a memorable apocalypse short in “Transmission”
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