Kill List
June 20th 2011 06:38
Jay (Neil Maskell) and Sam (Michael Smiley) are old mercenary buddies. Conventional combat is over, but the professional killing has only been curbed. There are still jobs to be done and good money to be made. Jay and wife Shel (MyAnna Buring) are going through a rough patch, so some quick solid dosh would do the family a lot of favours. Shel understands her husband’s line of clandestine work, as she did her time as a soldier in her homeland of Sweden. Sam’s new girlfriend, Fiona (Emma Fryer), knows nothing of Sam’s covert killings. Until a dinner party with the four at Jay and Shel’s house turns sour with Jay throwing a temper tanty. Fiona steals into the bathroom and scrawls a strange pagan-looking symbol on the back of a wall mirror. Later she and Sam leave pissed as newts. Next day Sam and Jay drive to meet with their client (Struan Rodger).
There are three on the list, a priest (Gareth Tunley), a librarian (Mark Kempener), and an MP (James Nickerson). Jay and Sam set off to complete the job, but Murphy’s Law is firmly in place, and some seriously disturbed individuals join Murphy. What begins as routine, soon becomes something much more sinister than Jay and Sam could ever imagine. And it doesn’t just involve them. The kill list has their work cut out for them.
Director Ben Wheatley and co-writer Amy Jump have carved out an excellent horror-thriller, full of neat twists and turns and a thoroughly fucked-up ending that rightly slaps you hard in the face. Not every question is answered, but that only compounds the extraordinary level of menace that permeates the narrative and its complexities are its strengths. A good horror movie must maintain some semblance of mystery in order to perpetuate a high calibre of atmosphere and dread. Kill List has both in spades and shovels.
Warp X specialises in modest-budgeted movies, and Kill List was apparently made for only half a million pounds, but director Wheatley has used his budget sensationally. The domestic and interior settings of the movie’s first third only lures the viewer into a false sense of security, there’s location shooting, and some seriously cool special effects make-up sequences. In fact the violence in Kill List is some of the most shocking I’ve seen in a while. In the same way Scorsese uses violence; it frequently comes out of nowhere, and when it does, it’s extreme and disturbing.
The performances are strong, however I must say I struggled to understand some of the dialogue, especially between the two male leads. This was mostly due to the naturalistic delivery combined with their strong accents and intonation; Jay’s northern mumble and Sam’s Irish brogue. MyAnna delivers her best performance to date as Jay’s feisty pants-wearing wife.
Here's the trailer:
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Comment by Anonymous
The deft production and chemistry of the actors achieves remarkable synergies with pretty modest means, but ultimately reverts to something a bit more straightforward and ultimately predictable in the end.
Nearly brilliant, but not quite.