Relay is a clever action-thriller about a man who works outside the law to help corporate whistleblowers. While the film can be suspenseful and violent, it doesn’t stray into gratuitous violence. Unfortunately, frequent f-words push what should have been a PG-13 film solidly into R-rated territory.
Ash is in a … unique line of work.
His services aren’t advertised. No Yellow Pages ad or LinkedIn business profile here. You’d never even hear about him, not unless you found yourself in a strangely specific set of circumstances. And even then, you’d need some luck to get in touch.
Such is the case when said job tows the line of legality.
You see, Ash helps broker deals between would-be whistleblowers and their former megacorporate employers. The informants want to regain some semblance of a normal life, free from fear and harassment. The corporations are generally looking to get back some, ahem, sensitive information regarding their business dealings.
Ash considers both his clients. Not that he’ll ever meet them face to face. He works behind the scenes, through layers of inscrutable procedures and technology that make him nigh untraceable.
But that’s what it takes to get the job done and make his clients happy.
OK, happy might not be the word for it, but Ash’s arrangements meet his clients’ needs. And it doesn’t hurt that he gets some cash out of the deal as well.
Enter Sarah, a talented researcher who took too close a look at her pharmaceutical company’s troubling trial results. She lost her job, but not before taking a copy of the incriminating information. Since then, she’s been harassed by her former employer’s thugs, who were hired to get the documents back. Sarah has changed her mind about blowing the whistle but needs Ash’s help.
Ash agrees and lays out his precise terms (remotely, of course). But as he gets to know Sarah, it becomes increasingly difficult for him to hold to his own strict rules against clientele contact.
Especially when it becomes clear that Sarah’s former employer is willing to bury her along with the evidence.
Ash brokers his deals because, as he sees it, it’s “something that needs to be done.” Though the corporations are ostensibly his clients as well, he does his work with an eye toward helping individuals who have nowhere else to turn. At times, he puts himself in danger to protect his clients.
Ash participates in an addiction recovery group. One member of that group, a woman named Wash, gives him wise advice about not replacing “one addiction with a new one.”
Ash says that he grew up Muslim, though its unclear if he’s still practicing that faith. We also hear that consuming alcohol is prohibited in Islam.
A man laments missing his niece’s baptism. Song lyrics mention prayer. A restaurant takes its name from Greek and Norse deities.
Throughout their interactions—at first remotely and later in person—Ash and Sarah develop a tender romantic connection, though this never goes beyond a quick caress of a hand or hair.
Someone makes a crude sexual gesture. A few women wear revealing clothing. A woman’s social media image is paired with a caption that says, “Single and ready to mingle.”
For an R-rated action-thriller, Relay’s violence is refreshingly restrained. The film prefers to focus on Ash’s crafty ways of eluding enemies and keeping his clients safe. However, things do eventually boil over into outright violence.
A man is thrown from a moving vehicle at high speed during heavy traffic. Someone gets stabbed in the leg with a shard of glass. Another character is tasered. People shoot at each other with guns. Characters are bloodied and bruised, either from violence we see or that which is implied.
A man is struck by a car. Another car is set aflame as an intimidation tactic. Someone says that a pharmaceutical company’s lies have cost the lives of many people. Characters are threatened at gunpoint.
Despite Relay’s restraint in its depiction of violence, the same cannot be said for the language found here, which seems to be the reason this movie garnered an R-rating. More than 20 f-words are uttered, along with two uses of the s-word. God’s name is misused twice, paired once with the word “d—.” There’s one use each of “b–ch,” “a–” and “b–tard.”
The f-word is mouthed once, paired with a rude hand gesture. We see a few more rude hand gestures throughout the film. Someone says that a company is “screwing people over.” A man is called “parasitic scum.”
Ash is a recovering alcoholic. He shares that he started drinking to fit in and connect with people, especially as a Muslim in New York after the September 11 terrorist attacks. A high-pressure Wall Street job only furthered his addiction. Later, under significant duress, Ash goes to a bar and orders drinks. He takes a sip of the liquor before spitting it out and seeking support.
Wash, also a recovering alcoholic, helps lead Ash’s support group and says she has been sober for nine years. We hear a reference to the Twelve Steps of the Alcoholics Anonymous program. Sarah drinks wine and smokes. We see the exterior of a cigar shop.
Ash’s brokering job is borderline, if not downright, illegal. He takes advantage of existing infrastructure, including the Post Office and telecommunication services for the deaf and hard of hearing, to keep himself hidden. He facilitates under-the-table payments between his clients through a variety of shady methods.
The individuals whom Ash works with have engaged in theft, stealing information from their employers. Likewise, those employers are trying to cover up evidence of wrongdoing that could cause harm to people.
A would-be whistleblower reported his company’s malfeasance but was ignored and later pressured to sign a nondisclosure agreement, which he now regrets accepting. Another man feels guilty for not exposing his company’s misdeeds when he had the chance and feels that he has “blood on [his] hands” as a result.
Corporate thugs impersonate Treasury agents to get access to information. Someone requests a fake ID. A man pulls a fire alarm to create a distraction.
If you took Michael Clayton, mixed it with The Conversation, and added a dash of a Bourne movie’s countersurveillance flair, you’d be somewhere in the ballpark of Relay.
The film spins an intriguing yarn that shines a spotlight on the human cost of corporate greed. Its clever concept is built around the oft-overlooked elements of everyday infrastructure, and how someone might use those mundanities to their advantage. And it even provides a measured look at someone fighting to overcome an addiction and find hope.
Which makes it all the more frustrating that Relay saddles itself with unnecessary content issues. Profanity is the main culprit here. A rash of unnecessary f-words mar the film’s dialogue, as if the filmmakers were intentionally aiming to take their PG-13 flick into R territory and this was the quickest way to do it.
Language isn’t the only content concern, to be sure. The threat of violence hangs over the film. When that threat is made real, the violence, while not gratuitous, can be wince-worthy.
Additionally, some viewers might be uncomfortable with a film whose characters pretty much all exist in a murky moral and/or legal space.
In the end, Relay’s compelling narrative is garbled by its own insistence on embracing completely avoidable content issues.
Bret loves a good story—be it a movie, show, or video game—and enjoys geeking out about things like plot and story structure. He has a blast reading and writing fiction and has penned several short stories and screenplays. He and his wife love to kayak the many beautiful Colorado lakes with their dog.
