“The Ledge” is a thriller that offers its thrills in a very predictable way. However, it is unable to provide the catharsis needed to balance its buildup. The same one-bad-guy-ruins-it-all formula, and this time it is used from a rock-climbing angle, but does it work? Only if you want it to.
‘The Ledge’ Plot Summary
Kelly (Brittany Ashworth) and Sophie (Anaïs Parello) go on a rock-climbing spree where they meet four guys: Joshua (Ben Lamb), Reynolds (Nathan Welsh), Nathan (Louis Boyer), and Taylor (David Wayman). Right from the beginning, it is made clear that Joshua is an overly lascivious guy who is just waiting for a chance to sleep with a woman. And Sophie is the unlucky one whom he sets his eyes on. However, things take a drastic turn when Sophie falls from a cliff while trying to escape from Joshua, who was trying to molest her. However, Joshua, along with the other guys who followed him, finds out that Sophie is still breathing. To avoid getting caught later, they kill her and throw her off the mountain. This event is recorded by Kelly on her camera. She then runs with all four guys behind her who intend to destroy any further evidence. With no other way to escape, Kelly starts climbing a dangerous cliff but gets stuck on a ledge high up in the cold. Without any gear to climb down and the guys waiting for her about 20 feet above the ledge, she has to put her survival skills to the test and figure out a way to escape.
Meanwhile, Joshua starts killing his friends, Taylor, Nathan, and Reynolds, in that order, one by one, after each of them tries to figure out an alternate way out of the situation after being clearly scared of the consequences of what they have done and are going to do. Ultimately, it is Kelly vs. Joshua, one on one. Will Kelly be able to escape Joshua, or will Joshua be able to remove the last evidence of his crime? The answer hangs on “The Ledge.”
Joshua: The Pseudo Alpha Male
Joshua is the driving force of the plot. The film clearly states that Joshua has been the way he is since he was a kid. He put a guy in the hospital out of revenge, and the same instinct is making him do all this, revenge for the way Sophie mocked him. One cannot help but think about the “male ego” that is at work here. Perhaps, if a guy had said the same thing to him instead of Sophie, things would have been different, and he would probably have taken it in a fun way. But since it is a woman, he feels insulted, and for a lecherous guy like him, the only way to “give it back” to her is to force himself on her.
Again, had the things been said by a guy, his reaction wouldn’t necessarily have been casual. Keeping in mind the way he tries to force himself on others, as he did to Taylor at the beginning of the film, he would certainly have reacted the same way if a guy mocked him. However, it was very unlikely on the part of the creators to make Joshua’s character kill almost every other character without giving him a past that was more akin to his nature. All that we know is that he is a vengeful guy, but it seems too much for such a character, with an all-too-casual manner, to kill anyone. Be that as it may, Joshua dies at the end of the film, which is the only outcome that was expected.
Kelly’s Past
Kelly’s never-give-up attitude comes to her from her fiancé Luca, who died after falling while they were climbing the very hill she is stuck on in the film. The strength that resides in her comes from the faith that Luca had in her, and it is the film’s way of showing how important will is for survival. But, and it is a big but even for a film, does willpower compensate for the sheer impossibility of the fact that she was able to climb a hill that high without a rope and with a bag on her back? Well, let us keep our suspension of disbelief to ourselves and accept what we are shown. At the end of it all, it did feel like vengeance was served when Joshua fell down the hill.
‘The Ledge’ Ending Explained: Does Kelly Survive?
The end of “The Ledge” shows Kelly finally making her way out of the ledge and reaching the top of the hill. Interestingly, there is also a cross there, which in all probability is for Luca. It was Luca’s love for mountains that enabled him to not just teach Kelly the skill of rock-climbing but also give her the will and courage in the face of danger.
Final Words
Whether to watch this film is totally up to the viewer. It does have its moments of thrill, but it isn’t able to pull off the rush of adrenaline that is required for a film whose events, for the most part, occur on a cliff or a ledge of a hill.
The Ledge, directed by Howard J. Ford, is a 2022 thriller starring Brittany Ashworth, Anas Parello, Ben Lamb, Nathan Welsh, Louis Boyer, and David Wayman.
