Homestead (2024) review

Homestead is a unique movie experience. It’s essentially a movie primer for the Angel Studios streaming platform series.

As movie pilots for TV series go, it’s a lot almost bordering on overwhelming.

So much of Homestead feels like a hodgepodge of a full season’s worth of subplots and storylines. Given time for proper development, these storylines could probably make for a very compelling series. The appetizer approach taken by director Ben Smallbone offers teases of what’s in store for the series instead of making the movie a proper foundation for a spin-off.

A nuclear blast detonates in Los Angeles, presumably one of several strikes across the United States. Some characters attribute to an attack on the East Coast to the Russians, but Spanish-speaking characters illegally crossing international waters are the only onscreen culprits that are responsible for the L.A. nuke. Some sledgehammers have been struck with more subtlety.

Homestead is based on the Black Autum series from Jeff Kirkham and Jason Ross (available on Amazon). With over eight novels, the Black Autum series is one of the more popular in the growing post-apocalyptic military thriller genre so there’s plenty of viable source material to mine.

Predictably, mass panic erupts after the explosion. Ex-Green Beret Jeff Eriksson (Bailey Chase, S.W.A.T.) quickly springs into motion gathering his family — wife Tara (Kearran Giovanni, Black Lightning), sons Abe (Tyler Lofton) and Leif (Isaiah Dolan) and adopted daughter, Georgie (Georgiana White) — and heads to Homestead.

That’s the elaborate estate owned by wealthy Ian Ross (Neal McDonough). Ian opted to be prepared for any kind of attack or incursion and had Jeff and his former squad on retainer in case Homestead ever needed defending. He has to be ready in order to keep his wife, Jenna (Dawn Olivieri), and daughter, Claire (Olivia Sanabia), safe.

Like a decent series, there’s an abundance of characters with various motivations and agendas even within this closed off to the rest of the world community. Most of the subplots have solid hooks worthy of future exploration. One Homestead inhabitant was on medication and his prescription ran out, Jeff is getting pressure from his men to be more authoritative, and another inhabitant is terrified she saw the end of the world coming in a premonition.

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A curious dynamic begins to unfold as there’s a weird power struggle at play. Jeff wants Ian to think more strategically in order to preserve the Homestead position in the event that any large force attempts to invade. Whether from foreign agents or Ian’s neighbors once their supplies run out. Ian wants Jeff to remember he paid him to protect his family not act like dictators barking out orders constantly.

Ian also has to consider how those actions affect his family specifically Jenna, who occasionally goes out of the compound’s front gates to pass out supplies. Jenna is of the mindset that since they have this massive estate and so many supplies that they should help their neighbors and friends.

Screenwriters Phillip Abraham, Leah Bateman and Joseph Snyder have a challenging task in making Jeff and Ian likable considering the basis of their arrangement is self-preservation.

Jeff does come off too eager to rely on his gun to send a strong message to anyone approaching Homestead’s gates. And the estate really does have plenty of space for the few dozen families waiting outside the gates desperately hoping for scraps, so Ian seemingly doesn’t have a valid argument for Jenna either.

Jenna and Claire are the characters most easily identifiable as the “good” ones as they talk about God, seek guidance and counsel through prayer and genuinely care for their fellow man. The script allows for a range of character personalities and Jenna and Claire aren’t portrayed as clueless simply because they have faith even in this scenario.

There’s no weak link with the performances. McDonough is a reliable star actually playing against type here as he’s not the scheming, calculating bad guy. Chase gives Jeff a rough edge while not making him a shoot first and shoot second type aggressive character. Oliveri and Giovanni get more scenes than just being sounding boards for McDonough and Chase and shine as characters on their own.

Homestead is hardly a smooth setup for the series, but there’s enough building blocks to suggest the series could make for another solid streaming TV option.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10

Photo Credit: Angel Studios

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