“Rounding”

(USA)

Screened at the 58th Chicago International Film Festival (1/5); Letterboxd (1/5), Imdb.com (2/10)

I suppose there’s a story somewhere inside this medical drama/horror offering, but I’ll be damned if I can find it. Writer-director Alex Thompson’s second feature outing is a plodding, dull, meandering mess in which viewers wait patiently for something to happen and nothing ever does. When a brilliant young medical resident suffers a breakdown after losing a patient, he transfers to a small town hospital for a second chance, upon which he becomes obsessed with the mysterious symptoms of a respiratory patient. What follows is an unorganized collection of vague (and unscary) surreal images, tiresome dialogue laden with detailed medical jargon, unexplained and implausible plot developments, and a story that ultimately goes nowhere, one that even requires an explanation by one of the characters to inform the audience of what supposedly just happened. “Rounding” is a phenomenal waste of time that fails to live up to any of its hype – or potential.