It comes to something when you have to confer with another
website[1] to
explain a film you have just watched!! I was fine until about half way through
when it becomes completely incomprehensible. Ben Wheatley’s second feature film
Kill
List (2011), described as a British horror film, is an unsettlingly
strange mix involving contract killing’s, a study in paranoia and devil
worship. Well received by many of the critics, I’m not so sure?
 |
| The strange sign thats never really explained! |
Jay (Neil Maskell) lives with his wife Shel (MyAnna Buring) and
his seven-year-old son Sam (Harry Simpson) in an upmarket house, he has been
unemployed since his last job in Kiev that by all accounts went terribly wrong.
Shel complains that the money is running out and arranges a dinner party for
Jay’s ex army buddy Gal (Michael Smiley); they apparently served together in
Iraq. Over dinner, which is also attended by Gal new, rather weird, girlfriend
Fiona (Emma Fryer) who when visiting the couples bathroom inscribes a strange
sign on the back of a wall hung mirror, one we originally see during the
opening credits. We learn during the meal that the two men are contract killers
and that Shel has organised for them to meet ‘The Client’ to arrange for more
work. This materialises in a contract to eliminate three targets, a Priest, a
Librarian and a Member of Parliament.
The Priest is disposed of in a clean and efficient manner.
The Librarian is discovered to have a stash of very hard-core pornography,
which sends Jay completely over the top, resulting in the gruesome killing of our
book person with a claw hammer, an act that leaves nothing to the viewer’s
imagination. Jay then goes of on a freebie and kills the person who was
responsible for producing the porn. Its when we come to the third person on the
kill list, the MP, that things start to go haywire, and it was from this point
onwards that I completely lost track of the plot.
 |
| When you go down to the woods tonight your sure of a big surprise. |
Although ambiguous it’s not a bad film, well directed by
Wheatley and well acted by all involved. It never allows the viewer to take anything
for granted, with a complex narrative that
invites questions that are not always answered. It has some extremely realistic
violent incidents the worst of which has to be the hammer scene, not for those
of a squeamish disposition, so be warned!
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