Coherence is a film about eight friends meeting up for a dinner party on the same night that a comet happens to be passing overhead. This being a film, the comet is no incidental coincidence and a lot of strange things start happening.

The film implies that the comet is the cause of these weird occurrences but never directly makes the connection, instead framing it among a series of theories each more outlandish than the last. At first it all seems fairly innocuous with tiny things like phone screens cracking or a lack of internet access but it’s not long before the power goes out leaving the house and the entire street engulfed in darkness other than one house that seems to have electricity. Paranoia quickly sets in which causes old resentments and conflicts start to emerge as the mystery deepens and the intensity rises. To say more about the mystery would be considered a major spoiler and you really should see the film for yourself to get the full experience of the mystery.

Pretty much the entire film is set in the same house, the parts that aren’t take place around the house so there is a strongly claustrophobic atmosphere to the whole thing, as the audience I felt like I was in the middle of a tense situation as the group of friends increasingly got on each others nerves. As the plot progresses more theories about what is going on are posited which involves the characters jumping to some fairly outlandish and rapid conclusions but in the context of the story it works and it’s played for laughs most of the time.

Naturally such a story hinges on the effectiveness of the characters who all feel well rounded here. The central focus is on Em (Emily Foxler) and Kevin (Maury Sterling) who have a fairly unstable relationship which comes under further threat by Kevin’s ex Laurie (Lauren Maher). Much of the story’s paranoia and mistrust comes from these three characters with the others circling awkwardly around. Another standout is Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Nicholas Brendon playing Mike, hilariously an actor from cult TV show Roswell, he is a man who suffers from a drinking problem which is amplified by this situation much to the upset of his wife Lee (Lorene Scafaria). These characters and the others all feel natural in their dialogue with each other and give a clear impression that they have a rich and varied history with one another.