- Title: What Happens in Miami
- IMDb: link
What Happens in Miami is a lackluster thriller focused on a group of friends Ashlei Sharpe Chestnut, Annalisa Cochrane, Rachel Leyco, and Jada Elena Wooten one of whom (Cochrane) goes missing while on spring break. The focus on the film isn’t about the loss of their friend, what happened to her, emotional drama or fallout but instead the girls being afraid of the police who for some unknown reason believe they are better suspects than the missing girl’s drug dealer boyfriend (Christopher Collins) who was with her when she went missing.
The movie breaks down the interwoven threads of current events, which center around the girls talking to police and lawyers, and flashbacks to spring break that fill in gaps over the course of the film revealing the missing Autumn (Cochrane) was a real bitch to even her closest friends. We get late reveals and even a not-so-shocking twist before the film mercifully, finally, concludes.
Jackie Logsted‘s script fails in that it doesn’t give us any reason to care for these girls. While Autumn is meanest of the bunch, none of the vapid would-be social-influencers, nor the various secrets they are keeping from the police, are all that interesting. It’s not sexy enough to be alluring. It’s not mysterious enough to be interesting. It lacks any sense of danger to work as a thriller. And it’s lack of any emotional punch means it has no chance to work as a drama. What Happens in Miami should definitely stay in Miami.
Watch the trailer