“Focus. What do you see?” opens a voiceover in the trailer for Gazer, the directorial debut from Ryan J. Sloan. We see a promising clip of a new thriller, shot on 16 mm and bearing a bit of a resemblance to Christopher Nolan’s Memento.
The latter point is a comparison Gazer is leaning into, highlighting a quote from a critic who had the same observation in the back half of the trailer. The clip focuses on Frankie Rhodes (Ariella Mastroianni, who co-wrote the film), a young mother who witnesses some sort of crime through an apartment window. She’s also suffering from a degenerative cognitive disorder, so she records herself talking into cassettes, seemingly both to help her keep her own bearings and to leave for her daughter. Per a plot synopsis, “She takes a risky job from a mysterious woman with a dark past, which leads her to become entangled in a tense web of revenge, deceit, and murder.”
Gazer sounds like it was a labor of love to create. A press release emphasizes that it was shot on a “shoestring budget” on nights and weekends while Sloan worked as an electrician and Mastroianni as a film programmer over a two-year span. Drawing from the thrillers of the 1970s and 80s, Gazer certainly looks like the product of two film buffs. The film opens in theaters on February 21, 2025.
