Blu-ray Review: Grisly ‘Kill List’ Follows Hit Man Into the Heart of Darkness

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CHICAGO – Graphic violence is a double-edged sword. It can shock viewers into acknowledging the tragic nature of carnage so often belittled in mainstream cinema, yet it can also repel viewers straight out of the theater before the end credits roll. Ben Wheatley’s “Kill List” is far from the most violent film in recent memory, but its few instances of onscreen bloodshed are unbearably savage.

This makes the film a perfect fit for IFC Midnight, which has specialized in distributing ultra-grisly indies. “Kill List” is one of their better releases this year, but it lacks the emotional and psychological depth of a film like Justin Kurzel’s “The Snowtown Murders.” Whereas Kurzel’s fact-based tale was about people who seemed frighteningly human, Wheatley’s film centers on a group of characters so witless that audiences may find it difficult to become involved in their plight. “Kill List” is entertaining enough to keep viewers watching from start to finish, but I doubt many will want to sit through it again.

Blu-ray Rating: 2.5/5.0

The film is at its strongest in the early sections fraught with frantic tension caused by the current recession. MyAnna Buring (a superb actress who looks strikingly like a Swedish Amy Seimetz) plays Shel, a married woman who has felt like a single mother ever since her husband, a thick-headed hit man named Jay (Neil Maskell), stopped working. He’s remained unemployed for the last eight months, and the economic strain has threatened to derail their marriage. Even Jay’s son, Sam (Harry Simpson), admits that he thinks his dad is lazy. It’s not long before Jay’s old partner, Gal (Michael Smiley), turns up to invite him on a lucrative new three-part assignment. Their employers seem like tremendously shady characters, and weirdly require Jay to have his hand slit prior to completing his mission. Weirder still are the reactions of their assigned victims, who all appear oddly grateful about their imminent demise. The escalating strangeness causes Jay to lose his cool, though it was clear from the very first frame that he had a short temper. Since Jay is utterly incapable of controlling his emotions, he inches him and Gal closer and closer toward certain doom. There’s a chilling protracted shot that follows Gal as he investigates the latest casualties of his partner’s rage. He appears to be literally entering the “heart of darkness,” yet the film has an even more insidious twist up its sleeve. I’ll refrain from revealing any specific spoilers, though it must be said that the last act shifts from the realm of a gritty crime thriller to a hokey horror world occupied by cult favorites like “The Wicker Man.”

Kill List was released on Blu-ray on August 14, 2012.
Photo credit: IFC Films

The film’s most buzz-worthy scene on the festival circuit shocked viewers with its sudden violence, and it must be said that the gore effects are second to none. No image is quite as unseemly as violence to the human skull, though no film has come close to matching the in-your-face brutality of Gaspar Noé’s “Irreversible” (“Drive” came close, but its Noé-inspired sequence endured heavy edits). What makes Wheatley’s scene so affecting is the performance of Mark Kempner, who plays the victim with a sense of serenity that is deeply disturbing. With its cautionary attitude toward violence, “Kill List” is ultimately a wholly moral picture, but also a rather goofy one. The final moments are so far-fetched that they cause more eye rolls than shivers. It’s clear that Wheatley, who made his feature debut with 2009’s crime comedy, “Down Terrace,” is immensely gifted at building an atmosphere of dread, and this jarring thriller does make one intrigued to see what the filmmaker will attempt next. But for all of its considerable merits and good intentions, Wheatley’s sophomore effort is a bloody mess.

“Kill List” is presented in 1080p High Definition (with a 2.35:1 aspect ratio), accompanied by English and Spanish subtitles, and includes some insightful interviews with the cast and crew. Wheatley talks about the danger of depicting violence in an unrealistic way, and says that his film was made in response to the offensively whimsical portrayal of hit men as folk heroes in “loads of other pictures” (“The Matador” certainly comes to mind). He wanted audiences to be unable to “laugh off” the violence in his film, and in that regard, he succeeded beyond measure. Producers Claire Jones and Andrew Starke pop up to discuss their work on the low-budget production, while Maskell and Buring recall their previous collaboration on Wheatley’s sketch comedy series, “The Wrong Door.” A wordless making-of featurette offers some glimpses at the film’s gore effects, though never shows enough the ruin the illusion.

Viewers who were particularly disturbed by the film are guaranteed to find catharsis in the disc’s two delightful audio commentary tracks. It’s odd to hear the filmmakers making light of the serious onscreen carnage, yet perhaps their reaction is merely due to their discomfort in sitting through it. On the actor’s track, Buring elicits a big laugh from her co-stars Maskell and Smiley after claiming that the film’s violence is the “opposite of ‘Tom and Jerry.’” Whereas the actors are rather tight-lipped about their own interpretations of the film’s plot, Wheatley is more candid on his commentary track, and provides his own opinion of the meaning behind an eerily ambiguous smile in the film’s final scene. The director is joined by his wife and frequent collaborator Amy Jump, who co-wrote the film’s script and voices her own differing opinions of various scenes. Their chemistry is apparent, and it’s rather amusing to hear the couple become repulsed by their own film. During an especially extreme instance of violence, Wheatley admits, “I tend not to watch this bit.”

By MATT FAGERHOLM Staff Writer HollywoodChicago.com matt@hollywoodchicago.com