Post by GL on Feb 22, 2007 10:53:23 GMT -5
"Wolf Creek" is a terribly boring and completely overrated torture film.
**SPOILERS**
Traveling through Australia, British tourists Ben Mitchell, (Nathan Phillips) Liz Hunter, (Cassandra Magrath) and Kristy Earl, (Kestie Morassi) go through the Outback on their way to the crater called Wolf Creek. Arriving at the sight and spending time wandering around, they get caught in a rainstorm and become stranded in the wilderness. Happened upon by Mick Jones, (John Jarratt) who offers to take care of their car troubles, they accept his help and ride back to the city. Waking up instead in his shop, they find they are held prisoner and are tortured mercilessly, all for the thrill of it. Gathering up their strength, they make a desperate effort to escape before being killed by the madman.
The Good News: There isn't that much at all to really like. The outback locations are rendered with a nice eye and bring in a sense of spooky isolation at times, as if anything could happen to you out here and no-one would know, much less be able to help. That sense of isolation is nicely captured, and gives it some points. The only other part that works is the final half-hour, which is where all the action and torture is. Some of them are pretty good, especially the truck chase down the highway, which has a spectacular revelation as well as the film's keynote sequence, where a victim is attacked in a garage and inflicted with one of the greatest and most inventive tortures around. It's brutal, creative, and quite effective, and is the best sequence in the film, along with the rest of the scenes in that time frame. Otherwise, this is a really overrated film.
The Bad News: This is a really overrated film. The way the story plays out amounts to most of the film's problems. By introducing the killer over forty minutes in means that the time spent before is all about the victims, and there is nothing going on. It's all about them driving around in the desert and visiting the crater. It's about nothing else and it's absolutely excruciating to sit through. It's not even about building suspense, as by the time it came to that point, it decides to throw more exposition along the way and make the film go on even longer. Even the fairly rousing final half can't make up for extreme inactivity and non-action in the beginning, and makes it nearly impossible to sit through at the right times. Another big factor is the extremely unextreme violence in this. For supposedly being a backwoods throwback, it contains so little gore as to be shocking. The film's goriest moment, the garage kill, is done with such rapid cuts and extreme shots that it renders it completely confusing as to what's going on. It also doesn't look that gory either, as scene where the fingers are snapped off, is done so that the finger stubs land and a shot back to a bloody hand is all that's seen, not at all that shocking. That all the rest of the blood and gore comes from seeing the remains of off-screen beatings or previous victims makes this completely unshocking in the gore department, not something that such a film with the wanted reputation it seeks. The film's last big flaw is the way it handles it's ending. It strips one of the main characters for well over twenty minutes of screen-time, then puts them back in to serve the climax, which really sticks out as being so obtrusive and clearly there for no reason other than having noticed the character was forgotten about and thrown in to give a sense of relief. It really doesn't work and is there for no reason, and is able to knock the film down even more, along with the other big factors, to make this a really dull, drawn-out, disappointing and overrated effort.
The Final Verdict: With a whole host of flaws mixed in with only a few good moments, this really doesn't do much of anything and serves as a severe disappointment. Had several flaws been fixed, which could've been quite easy to do, this would at least rated higher, but this is only for those who enjoy these kind of movies.
Rated R: Graphic Language, Graphic Violence and drug use