Helmer David Mackenzie on His TIFF Thriller ‘Relay’: ‘I’m very drawn to these sort of outsider characters’

David Mackenzie delivers a tight thriller with “ Relay ,” premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film stars Riz Ahmed as Tom, who operates as sort of a middleman between corporate whistleblowers and the companies. The extremely clandestine Tom operates in a morally ambiguous area until Lily James’ Sarah engages his services.

What follows becomes a cat and mouse game and a mix of high and low tech that climaxes in a tense twist, with some shade thrown at corporations, too. Black Bear Intl. reps international rights for the thriller, while CAA Media Finance and UTA Independent Film Group are handling the U.

S. The director behind “Hell and High Water” and “Under the Banner of Heaven” is currently close to wrapping his next film, “Fuze,” which is filming around London and stars Aaron Taylor-Johnson. “So it’s been pretty intense, sort of complex, kind of heisty type thing all around London.

Yeah, it’s coming out quite nicely, I think. But it’s definitely been hard work,” he says “I’ve done lots of arthouse films, and I love those films, but I’m trying to find a way of doing films that are still sophisticated, but are also slightly more kind of audience engaging and potentially commercial.” “Relay” could have easily starred Warren Beatty and been a hit in 1973.

Mackenzie grins a little at this, acknowledging that that was the type of thriller he was aiming to make. “And I thought that Riz would be a more interesting cont.