Wolf Creek (18)

Film

Thrillers

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Time Out says

Tue Sep 13 2005

Set in the Australian outback, and tapping into contemporary fears about feral killers who prey on vulnerable tourists, Greg McLean’s gut-wrenching, nerve-shredding debut feature boasts some nightmarish scenes of human cruelty. Yet we never for a moment doubt his integrity or motives, still less his control over the medium. Shot on digital video by a filmmaker with a background in painting and theatre, it fuses beautifully textured images with fierce, intense performances and a jarring soundtrack to create a shattering vision of primal terror. Like ‘The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’, McLean’s film has a brutally effective two-act structure. The build-up is deceptively slow, then the ground is ripped from under us and we freefall into a savage world of chases, torture and death. Aussie Ben (Nathan Phillips) and two British tourists, Liz (Cassandra Magrath) and Kristy (Kestie Morassi), set out for Wolf Creek, where a vast crater has been left by a meteor impact. Having explored the crater, they find their watches have stopped and their car won’t start. As night falls, they are rescued by Mick Taylor (John Jarratt), a grizzled Crocodile Dundee type who tows their car to a remote, abandoned mining site. Over a campfire meal, the group swap edgy anecdotal banter. Next morning, Liz awakes bound and gagged. And then the screaming starts. This radical shift of tone and point of view is so disorientating that it throws us completely off balance, and we never recover our equilibrium. The film takes to extremes the distressing empathy we feel at the sight of someone being hunted and tortured. The violence is flat, ugly and remorseless, our sense of powerlessness overwhelming. Compare this to Austrian intellectual Michael Haneke’s overly self-conscious ‘Funny Games’, which lectured us about the seductiveness of screen violence. By making us feel the pain, Greg McLean’s ferocious, taboo-breaking film tells us so much more about how and why we watch horror movies.

Author: NF

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Release details

Rated:

18

UK release:

Fri Sep 16 2005

Duration:

99 mins

Cast and crew

Cast:

John Jarrat, Nathan Phillips, Kestie Morassi, Cassandra Magrath

Production Designer:

Robert Webb

Editor:

Jason Ballantine

Cinematography:

Will Gibson

Producer:

David Lightfoot, Greg McLean

Screenwriter:

Greg McLean

Director:

Greg McLean

Music:

Francois Tetaz

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Rated as: 0/5 (0 ratings)

  • "This kind of movie much rather tells "us" the ugly *truth* about violence and brutality in real life, I'd say. - and how even in film, it stops being entertaining and exciting if played REALLY straight. Even going a step further - like some other movies, one could easily call it a deconstruction of "entertaining" horror thrillers and their "iconic" villains. Mick Taylor is a highly charismatic and colorful character, the way he acts and speaks - but rather than enjoying him as a "great villain", given the like-like nature of what's happening in the movie, the viewer's rather compelled to see him as an actual evil bastard who uses humor and charisma as weapons. One is reminded of the fact that actual killers are often funny and charismatic, too, and that is a much more questionable thing to "enjoy" in any way - and maybe stops to think for a second just how funny all those Jokers and Freddy Kruegers really are. So that's what I'd say the movie reminds "us" of - not somehow why we watch horror movies or something."

    anonymous Thu Dec 20 2012
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  • "taboo-breaking film tells us so much more about how and why we watch horror movies." Uh, horror films are often watched for cathartctic entertainment. This kind of movie much rather tells "us" the ugly thought about violence and brutality in real life, I'd say. One thing I'll have to disagree on - I don't think this movie is as "relentless" as described here. In the way it's shot, yes, but the script includes certain elements that give the viewer a "way out", so to speak, by having characters act artificially unreasonable and bending the rules of realism in a few spots.. The initial situation isn't as "hopeless" - unrealistically, perhaps, they manage to free themselves and subdue the killer. But then they inexplicably refrain from finishing him off, and after he inexplicably recovers, he proceeds to come after them in inexplicable, implausible ways. One gets the feeling that the worst events playing out are some kind of what-if-scenario / cautionary tale than the naked slice-of-life scenario it started out as. Which one might call a good thing, in a way.

    ananymous Thu Dec 20 2012
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