The Indie Brit-film Kill List was considered one best films of 2011 by British critics: but audiences were more critical of this surreal horror-thriller.
Jay (Neil Maskell) is a hit-man who has mental scars after a mission goes wrong in Kiev, resulting with him not being able to work for eight months. He is running out of money and keeps fighting with his wife (MyAnna Buring). But Jay's friend and partner, Gal (Michael Smiley), tells him of a job to kill three people: a seemingly simple job. But Jay is forced down a strange odyssey with this victims seemingly knowing about him and his past, leading to a surreal conclusion.
The first hour of the Kill List was perfectly fine, the first 30 minutes setting up the troubled home situation and it could have worked as a short film and the killings were brutal, well shot and felt like we were going somewhere with the mystery of how people knew about Jay, whether it real or all in his mind. But the final third goes straight off the deep end when it takes a very surreal turn at the end, turning into The Wicker Man and the very ending was the same as A Serbian Film. There are potential themes about facing your past, how violence affect people's personally lives, how people can try to justify violence and how violence can be so self-destructive and lead to your overall corrupt and downfall. But all these ideas are undermined and underplayed when it turns into a barmy art house experiment.
The acting by the main cast is strong throughout and director Ben Wheatley does bring a brutal sensibility. The violence is truly shocking as one character suffers from a horrific torture and Wheatley is not afraid to show the duration and the results: but unlike say Mel Gibson he does not take pleasure and joy out of the violence, it is meant to tough to watch. Wheatley knows have to craft a scene, get good performances out of his actor but he does need a new editor because there were some strange cuts that made the film look like DVD skips.
There were decent ideas and Kill List was very well for a low budget film, but it felt more like a collection of events then a complete narrative and did not form its ideas and themes properly. The final third ruined the potential film had and it came off as very silly. The only acceptable explainable that it was final illustration of Jay's madness.
Jay (Neil Maskell) is a hit-man who has mental scars after a mission goes wrong in Kiev, resulting with him not being able to work for eight months. He is running out of money and keeps fighting with his wife (MyAnna Buring). But Jay's friend and partner, Gal (Michael Smiley), tells him of a job to kill three people: a seemingly simple job. But Jay is forced down a strange odyssey with this victims seemingly knowing about him and his past, leading to a surreal conclusion.
The first hour of the Kill List was perfectly fine, the first 30 minutes setting up the troubled home situation and it could have worked as a short film and the killings were brutal, well shot and felt like we were going somewhere with the mystery of how people knew about Jay, whether it real or all in his mind. But the final third goes straight off the deep end when it takes a very surreal turn at the end, turning into The Wicker Man and the very ending was the same as A Serbian Film. There are potential themes about facing your past, how violence affect people's personally lives, how people can try to justify violence and how violence can be so self-destructive and lead to your overall corrupt and downfall. But all these ideas are undermined and underplayed when it turns into a barmy art house experiment.
The acting by the main cast is strong throughout and director Ben Wheatley does bring a brutal sensibility. The violence is truly shocking as one character suffers from a horrific torture and Wheatley is not afraid to show the duration and the results: but unlike say Mel Gibson he does not take pleasure and joy out of the violence, it is meant to tough to watch. Wheatley knows have to craft a scene, get good performances out of his actor but he does need a new editor because there were some strange cuts that made the film look like DVD skips.
There were decent ideas and Kill List was very well for a low budget film, but it felt more like a collection of events then a complete narrative and did not form its ideas and themes properly. The final third ruined the potential film had and it came off as very silly. The only acceptable explainable that it was final illustration of Jay's madness.