Revenge (2017)
*** (out of 4)
Rather insane French film has Richard (Kevin Janssens) taking his mistress Jen (Matilda Lutz) to a house that is used by him and his hunting buddies. The hunting buddies Stan (Vincent Colombe) and Dimitri (Guillaume Bouchede) arrive and the next morning Jen is raped by one of them. Fearing what might happen Richard tries to kill Jen but after a horrendous injury she survives to get revenge.
I guess the only word that comes to my mind after watching this film is "wow." I mean, really? To say that I'm a bit shocked would be an understatement and I say that for a number of reasons. This film was released to all sorts of controversy with some people walking out on it and others calling it a masterpiece. Well, I didn't walk out on it and I don't think it's a masterpiece. REVENGE is certainly an entertaining movie but the more I think about it the more logical issues I have with it.
For starters, I'm going to avoid spoilers but how in the Hell did Jen survive what happened to her? With that out of the way, the first portion of this film is exceptionally good with director Coralie Fargeat doing a terrific job with the introduction of the characters and she also handles the pre-rape sequence very well. These rape/revenge movies have been done to death but I thought the director did a great job building up the tension leading up to the rape.
What didn't work with the film was a few logical issues that kept creeping up throughout the movie including it appearing that all of the characters turned into superheroes. Another problem with the film is that at times I think all of the style gets in the way of the story but this here was just a minor issue. Even with these issues you can't help but love the performances from the entire cast and especially those of Lutz and Janssens. Both of them were wonderful in their parts and especially Lutz since she doesn't get much dialogue and instead must act with her eyes to let us know what's going on with the character.
The music score, the cinematography and editing are all wonderful and there's no doubt that this is an extremely well-made film. As I said, I thought there were certainly some flaws but even with them I couldn't help but enjoy the film as a pure exploitation picture. I mean, there's a lot of really graphic violence and a ton of blood throughout the movie so gore hounds are going to be happy. The film is pretty darn sleazy throughout and for the most part I enjoyed it.
