Here's hoping that Roger Christian isn't only remembered for his back-to-back work on Battlefield Earth (as director) and Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (as second-unit director), because he's a better man than that. Two decades earlier, Christian served as art director on both Star Wars and Alien before finally getting in the director's chair for The Sender, which Quentin Tarantino once named as "his favorite horror film of 1982" (there wasn't much in the way of competition, sure, but John Carpenter's The Thing absolutely blows it out of the water). Either way, let's focus on what we have here: an insulated, claustrophobic story about a mysterious young man (Zeljko Ivanek, Argo) who's admitted to the county mental institution after his failed suicide attempt at a nearby lake.

Named "John Doe #83" by the staff, our quiet central character experiences strange and horrifying hallucinations that, soon enough, are projected into the minds of others around him. The first victim of this phenomenon is Gail Farmer (Kathryn Harrold, Raw Deal), the psychiatric doctor in charge of John Doe's care; she dismisses what appears to be a home invasion by the young man when it's revealed that he's still on the hospital grounds. But after the strange occurrences deepen in frequency and intensity---including several visits from a woman claiming to be his estranged mother Jerolyn (Shirley Knight, As Good as It Gets)---the true nature of his mental ability is questioned.

Written by Thomas Baum (The Manhattan Project, Witness to the Execution), The Sender starts off well by building a strong atmosphere that's aided by the performances of Ivanek and Harrold. The film's premise provides ample fodder for interesting visual effects and a handful of genuinely horrifying moments, which are exercised with varying degrees of success. Unfortunately, The Sender just treads water from there on out: it's obvious where the story is headed about a third of the way through, so the resulting jump scares and left turns only provide surface-level tension. Refreshingly enough, John Doe isn't confined to the hospital for the entire film, as The Sender's last stretch attempts to bring the story full-circle by exploring elements of his mysterious past. But it's not enough and, like everything before it, more concerned with shocking plot elements that actually putting them together in a meaningful way.

Still, The Sender manages to serve up a strong atmosphere and the central performances are mostly quite good. The director's recent interest in revisiting his film---no doubt spurned by the praise of Tarantino---offers some hope that we'll get a more refined version of this story the second time around...but at the same time, I'm picturing the same lackluster CGI and style-over-substance mentality that crippled 2011's The Thing and about two dozen other horror remakes. For now, Olive Films' Blu-ray of The Sender serves up a passable A/V presentation but absolutely no bonus features, which severely limits this disc's appeal to all but its most enthusiastic fans.

Presented in its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio, The Sender looks decent in 1080p and represents an obvious upgrade from Legend's 2008 DVD. Image detail and textures are good for the most part, especially during outdoor close-ups. Shadow detail wavers quite a bit in some spots (especially during a few later nighttime scenes) and is most likely a source material issue, while and no major digital imperfections---excessive DNR, digital noise, etc.---were spotted along the way. Dirt and debris can be a little problematic at times, and a few odd green scratch-like marks were briefly spotted in one or two places. Overall, though, it's a fairly clean presentation that fans will appreciate; I certainly didn't think The Sender would ever reach Blu-ray, but it's a logical fit for the Olive brand. Just for the record, this appears to be a single-layered disc...but the film is less than 90 minutes with no extras, so no problems there.

This DTS-HD 2.0 Master Audio presentation is a split mono track and really shows its age, as The Sender is fast approaching its 35th birthday. Dialogue is occasionally buried deep in the mix and you'll probably have to crank up the volume higher than normal to make out some of the subtle moments. Music cues are typically clean and well-defined without fighting (again, considered the film's age and one-channel roots)...but, like a few of the jump scares and other frightening moments, they occasionally overpower everything else. Unfortunately, no optional English subtitles or captions have been included during the main feature, which isn't all that surprising for an Olive disc.

Though it has an interesting premise and a few genuinely horrifying moments, The Sender never really clicks as a whole and falls apart near the end...but even with its slight "Cronenberg for Beginners" vibe, horror fans should still check this one out and decide for themselves. It's an odd candidate for high definition, though: The Sender isn't visually ambitious and mostly shot indoors, though Olive Films' Blu-ray still offers a notable improvement over Legend's 2008 DVD. Nonetheless, the low replay value and complete lack of bonus features don't make this an easy one to recommend...so unless you're a die-hard fan, The Sender is worth a weekend spin at the very most. Rent It.