Greetings one and all, boils and ghouls, predator and prey, and please pardon the fresh offal on the floor (as well as the lapse in reviews . . . as we all know life happens -- as does chemically induced catatonia, ha!) It's been a long day. But in all seriousness, I have been preoccupied with other important matters. Needless to say I have returned with several films to hog-tie to the chopping block for your amusement (and my own pressure-cooker venting) over the next couple of days. So step over the slop, pull up a chair (here's a towel, you might want to wipe that down before you sit), and prepare to meet . . .
THE HORSEMAN (2008, Australia)
Dir.: Steven Kastrissios
This interesting little entry into the rape/revenge genre I so love is a variation on the theme, coming from the psychotic father takes revenge side of the camp.
The film opens with a man in a pest control outfit terrorizing another fellow, who is cowering and bloodied in a corner on the floor, with a crowbar. The pest controller is also destroying everything in the room : VHS cassettes, computer equipment, cameras, etc. The man on the floor is then doused in gasoline and set ablaze.
The pest controller is Christian, a miserable bastard if ever one there was, and with good reason. Not too long ago he received a video tape in the mail, a film called "Young City Sluts 2," which had his (recently deceased) daughter all over the packaging. Like any horrified, grieving, and most assuredly angry parent, he watches the tape. It's a friendly little gang-bang video that features her amidst several sweaty, pale, and hairy guys (just like real porn!) and she's not looking too coherent. As a matter of fact, she is drunk and speed-balling, and obviously had very little clue as to her situation at that filmed moment. Well, this sends pop on a violent, self and soul questioning quest to avenge his daughters mistreatment and death. Along the way he befriends a young prostitute/former addict roughly his daughters age, who really seems to provide a particular emotional support/daughter "replacement" to him that keeps him from committing suicide a couple of times throughout the film.
Unfortunately, as intriguing as the film is, as intense and well acted as the characters are, and as downright nasty-violent as it gets at points (though never overly gratuitous or graphic, a definite blessing here in some regards), the film is paced like cold molasses. Eventually things kind of backfire, and Christian and his friend are subsequently caught and punished by the pornographers. Christian saves the girl, kills the guys who killed his daughter, but finds out some hard-to-handle info along the way. Like his daughter had WANTED to make the film, sought out to do it for kicks and easy money. Christian does not take that info well at all, it shatters him inside. The acting in this film is top notch, potent and powerful. You feel Christian's pain throughout, and it's hard. But, again, so is the pacing, not just hard but you also feel it throughout.
HOWEVER, this film is definitely worth seeing. Christian, in his fits of measured lunatic violence while torturing the scum of the earth, uses methods that would make Guantanamo Bay proud. Horrible, terrible things are done to penises in this film : bike tire air pumps get shoved in urethra and, well, pumped; fishhooks get inserted into the tip while connected to a stand alone reel, being pulled ever so slowly, reeled in like it's some kind of strange and repulsive fish. Thankfully, all of that is fairly non-graphic. Even the porn video with his daughter is more implied than shown, but oh do you get the idea. I do find it interesting the way the filmmakers handled the subject matter, they really could have run off all buck wild with the sensationalistic and more exploitation-ripe aspects, but that is kept to a real minimum, and to great effect. In this instance, being more graphic would have definitely cheapened it a bit. Conversely, it probably would have made the proceedings a wee bit more exciting. But the extreme violence that is up close are the vicious beatings, just some of the most violent pummelings I have seen in film in a long time.
All in all, not a terrible venture, a decent deep film worthy of a viewing, just a little slow paced, and not in the good way, for my tastes.
