Taron Egerton playing a weirdo is a gift. But even gifts have their limitations. For Egerton, that limitation appears to be Apex, a survival thriller now on Netflix. Tapping into his oddness can turn a mediocre project into something special. See last year’s Apple TV miniseries Smoke, where his charisma and his creep factor prove equally compelling. (No, seriously, go watch that!) It cannot, however, get the heart of a sluggish, straight-to-streaming film beating.

Sasha (Charlize Theron) is an adventurer in mourning. While tandem climbing Norway’s Troll Wall, the weather takes a turn, and her boyfriend Tommy (Eric Bana) is knocked unconscious by falling rocks and snow. His deadweight threatens to send them both plummeting to the ground below if she does nothing. To save her life, she makes the smart, but horrifying, choice to cut him loose.

Months later, she travels to Australia to honor Tommy the only way she can, by also spiking her own adrenaline with an outdoor adventure. While buying supplies, a couple of locals harass her until Ben (Egerton) steps in on her behalf. It’s a fake out, though. He’s the apex predator in these parts, and he’s looking to make her his newest most dangerous game. And no, her opinion on the matter doesn’t count.

It’s a classic hook. Sociopathic villain hunts competent but wounded (literally and figuratively) protagonist. And while Apex plays in that space, it’s fun. Egerton is a kick, dancing while giving his prey a head start, making his glee both childlike and deeply unnerving. Alas, despite what the trailer implies, this dynamic is short-lived. Not even half of the film’s 95 minutes is devoted to Ben chasing Sasha through the forest and across the waterways of the national park. It’s the movie at its most compelling. And yet, it barely explores it before bailing.

Instead, the film gives considerable real estate to two rock-climbing scenes—the table-setting opener and the final sequence—neither as exciting nor emotionally resonant as the filmmakers hope. Part of it is that Jeremy Robbins’ script never gives the Sasha-Tommy dynamic enough depth, either during or after, to make it feel as though our protagonist has lost her one and only. Theron’s stoic performance, while well done, doesn’t help. The movie barely allows the audience to see beyond her tough exterior. As a result, her reserve doesn’t read as armor against emotion so much as just straight-up unemotional. Sasha and Tommy’s lack of connection is then mirrored by Sasha and the viewers. We, too, lack a strong connection.

Director Baltasar Kormákur’s work is at its best when it gives itself over to either the scenery or Ben and Sasha’s interactions. A scene in a kind of natural abattoir in an Australian cave features almost nothing but the two characters in a battle of wits and is Apex at its, well, apex. Theron lets some of Sasha’s fear and sly craftiness surface, two qualities the film gives us far too little of throughout. Egerton also gets to go his biggest, talking about mysticism and his mom as he presents a muddled spiritualism that reads as both earnest and obviously deeply irrational.

More of this, and the two beating the bejesus out of each other, and Netflix would’ve had itself a picture. As it is, though, this scene serves to highlight how often it falls short of its potential. The components are all there. Great and dangerous setting. A grim, smart, and determined Theron. A fanatical and unraveling Egerton. Unlike Sasha, though, Apex refuses to cut itself free of the dead weight, tumbling into disappointment as a result.

Apex is on the hunt now on Netflix.

Apex Trailer: