Struggling to survive after a helicopter crash, an English geologist is guided by the voice of an American pilot whose plane was also brought down. Guiding her through the harsh conditions, he seems to be a beacon of hope. Until he isn’t. A film by Hugo Keijzer, starring Ella Balinska, Rob Delaney, Stuart Graham, and Vanessa Ifediora.

Beth Brennan (Vanessa Ifediora) has been diagnosed with a terminal illness, and despite doctors exhausting all possible treatments, her body simply isn’t responding. Geologist Abby (Ella Balinska) is determined to save her older sister Beth by taking her to Clinique Monte Rosa, a facility known for its immunotherapy techniques.

However, Dr. Emmerson (Valerie O’Connor) advises Abby that foreign private clinics often operate outside conventional ethical standards. Emmerson also explains that even if Abby could afford the treatment, these private clinics might not be able to save Beth, especially given her recent health complications.

To secure enough funds for her sister’s treatment, Abby takes a job at the Rich Metal Mining compound in the Georgian Caucasus near the Russian border. There, she is paired with Sergi (Konstantine Roinishvili) to search for nuclear material in rugged mountainous terrain.

The Georgian Caucasus refers to the part of the Caucasus Mountains located within the country of Georgia, a nation situated at the crossroads of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. This mountainous region lies between the Black Sea to the west and the Caspian Sea to the east. Georgia’s northern border is formed by the Greater Caucasus mountain range, while the Lesser Caucasus runs across the southern part of the country. Georgia is bordered by Russia to the north and northeast, Azerbaijan to the east and southeast, Armenia and Turkey to the south, and the Black Sea to the west. The Georgian Caucasus is home to some of the country’s highest peaks, including Mount Shkhara and Mount Kazbek.

Days turn into weeks. Abby’s frustration mounts as she still can’t find any uranium ore. Growing desperate, she ignores Sergi’s warnings about dangerous wild animals and decides to venture outside their designated sector into the forest alone. She discovers a mysterious black rock unlike anything she’s ever seen.

Believing she’s stumbled upon something extraordinary, something she could sell to cover Beth’s immunotherapy, Abby suddenly gets a call from her father Archie (Stuart Graham). He tells her the doctor is sedating Beth because she’s in so much pain and only has days left. Worried, Abby tries to tell her father to stick to their plan and that she’s coming home. But before Archie can reply, the signal abruptly drops.

Sergi drives Abby to a nearby airfield, where she’s airlifted by helicopter to the international airport in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital. During the flight, pilot Tamaz (George Lasha) flies over the Ossetia valley, telling Abby his family used to live there before being forced out by the Russians, and how the region is now occupied territory. Despite not being allowed to cross, Tamaz flies as close as he can, blaring a Georgian folk song through the helicopter’s external loudspeaker.

The Ossetia valley refers to the valleys located in the Ossetia region, which is divided into North Ossetia (a republic within Russia) and South Ossetia (a disputed territory within the borders of Georgia). The valleys of Ossetia lie in the Caucasus Mountains, with South Ossetia occupying the southern slopes of the Greater Caucasus range and extending down toward the Mtkvari river in Georgia. South Ossetia is mountainous and includes valleys carved by rivers such as the Greater and Little Liakhvi.

Moments later, Abby spots what looks like a starling murmuration in the distance, which is odd for their altitude. As the swirling mass gets closer, Abby realizes they aren’t starlings at all. Suddenly the helicopter loses power and all the lights go out before plummeting from the sky and crashing onto a mountain.

Abby regains consciousness inside the helicopter’s wreckage. She’s only sustained minor injuries, but Tamaz has a fatal wound, and his co-pilot Lasha (Lasha Papuashvili) was killed on impact. Abby tries to use the radio for help, but it’s completely dead. After checking the map and seeing the nearest road is 60 kilometers away, Abby decides to walk. When she checks on him the next morning, Tamaz has already died.

As Abby sets off on foot through the forest, she hears a static noise coming from the helicopter wreckage. She races back inside and finds the noise is coming from a dual-band FM transceiver. Her hope fades when a man’s voice tells her he’s in the same situation and doesn’t even know where he is. The man named John (Rob Delaney) says he’s trapped inside his plane and can only remember seeing a big lake just before the crash

John also claims his long-range radio isn’t working, suspecting a branch might be caught in the antenna, but his legs are pinned, so he can’t reach it. Abby figures he can’t be too far, given that walkie-talkies only work over short ranges. Checking her map, she locates a large lake 30 kilometers away. Believing she can fix the antenna and call for rescue, she decides to make her way to John’s location.

Despite John’s repeated attempts to convince her to turn back, Abby becomes increasingly fixated on reaching his location. She believes it’s her only chance for rescue and to finally get back home to her sister. As Abby scales a limestone wall, she gets stuck on the last section with no foothold.

She pulls out the mysterious black rock, and to her surprise, it reacts to her touch. It reshapes itself along her fingertips, forming a piton. Abby jams it into a crack, using it as a step to reach the top of the cliff.

A piton is a metal spike, usually made of steel, used in rock climbing. Climbers hammer it into cracks or seams in the rock surface to create an anchor point. It has a hole or ring at one end, through which a carabiner and rope can be attached to help secure the climber, prevent falls, or assist in climbing progress.

While resting at an abandoned village she stumbles upon along the way, Abby encounters a Russian scout (Yevgeni Konstantinov) and accidentally shoots him in the leg. However, she eventually learns that the Russian scout also carries the mysterious black rock and has been talking to a man named Ivan on his walkie-talkie. Abby realizes John and Ivan are the same person and he is not who he claims to be.

Directed by Dutch filmmaker Hugo Keijzer in his directorial debut, “The OCCUPANT” is a survival sci-fi thriller. Keijzer co-wrote the screenplay with Philip M. Howe, Roelof Jan Minneboo, and Xiao Tang. The film follows a young English geologist who survives a helicopter crash and sets out across mountainous terrain to find a trapped American pilot, hoping to use his long-range radio to call for help and get both of them rescued.

While the premise is intriguing, the film struggles with pacing issues. The protagonist desperately needs money for her terminally ill sister’s treatment, which leads her to take a dangerous job searching for uranium near the Georgia-Russia border. However, the movie loses momentum by constantly shifting between past and present scenes when it should focus on the main survival story. With some tighter editing, they could have cut out the unnecessary subplots that really drag things out, making for a much more compact film.

Ella Balinska delivers a powerful performance as Abby, the protagonist determined to find her way back home to her dying sister. She commands the screen with compelling presence, carrying the narrative almost entirely on her own as the sole main character.

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The OCCUPANT premiered at SXSW London on 4 June 2025. The film had a limited theatrical release in the United States on 8 August. It was simultaneously made available on VOD on the same day.