Wolf Creek review by The Grim Ringler
Wolf Creek
Ok, first things first, is a film about torture a horror film, and if so, why?
Ah, welcome to torture cinema, the new trend in the Cineplex and one that will create a lot of controversy as it goes on. So, is Wolf Creek a horror film? Absolutely. Why? Because to me, the film wasn’t about the torture – not in a joyous, ‘oh, that’s nasty and great’ way – but was about the horror three people find when they are at the greatest point in their young lives. The horror is truly other people. It is the reality that, and this is why a lot of these films can work, there is always a monstrous person out there waiting to make someone a victim. The horror of this film is that 1. it’s real, as in it really happened, though to a degree it’s fictionalized and 2. it CAN happen. Freddy and Jason are scary in the way a cartoonish monster is – they are an accumulation of fears that range from the boogeyman to the devil. But when you are given real monsters, human monsters, the horror is in the real. Is in seeing what evil is and recognizing its eyes. Yes, this is a horror film. And not a pleasant one, but then, doesn’t that mean it has truly succeeded if it’s made you genuinely uneasy, and not just with gore, but with characters you care for and a ‘villain’ you truly fear.
Three friends returning from a two-week holiday stop off at the Wolf Creek crater in the outback of Australia, before they move on towards home. As they are there though their car won’t turn over on their return to it from a hike and so they have no choice but to wait for help. Fearful of him at first, the three warm up to their salty savior and decide to take him up on his offer of help, not knowing the horror that awaits them when they return to his camp. And when it comes, the nightmare seems as if it may never end.
The thing that blew me away about this film was how the filmmakers made sure to flesh out the main characters so that you really do care about the main three. You don’t want to see them get hurt. You don’t want to see them die. They’re decent college kids. And the killer isn’t a maniacal, screaming monster; he’s a man who truly isn’t part of the human race. Humans are just like cattle or any animal one might use or slaughter. They fulfill needs for him, they give him something to play with, but beyond that they mean nothing. This is a world that is not just set in reality but is reality. And in the outbacks of Australia you see, quite frighteningly, that the world still has places where Man can disappear and never been seen again.
The despair in the film will turn off many, as it turns off this reviewer, but I respect the hell out of a film that gives you a story that doesn’t turn its eye away from the true horror that humans can do to one another. This won’t be a movie you watch for fun. It won’t be a movie you pull out for friends. This is a movie to remind you that as small as the world seems, there are plenty of places to disappear, and that Man is still the worst monster roaming this planet.
The film is well made and wonderfully acted, with a chilling turn by the ‘villain’ of the piece. As I stated earlier, you actually care about the characters here and what happens to them. These are people who act like real people – which is to say, not always in the brightest of ways. The camera work and cinematography is well done also, creating a wasteland of Australia that looks a lot like Chainsaw Massacre’s Texas. And no, this is not that film, or any other. It’s reminiscent of several films because it lives in a subgenre that is getting a fair workout these days, but I wouldn’t say it’s aping any one film.
Unlike a lot of recent horror films,
this is the real deal. This is dark, it is unrelenting, and it shows the
audience, and characters, no pity in telling the story of a monster that
happens to be shaped like a man. This is a film that will anger many, repulse
many, and haunt all. And it’s a hell of a horror film.
…c…
8 out of 10 Jackasses blog comments powered by Disqus
