Revenge (2017)

REVENGE  (2017)  ¢ ¢ ¢ ¢
    D: Coralie Gargeat
    Matilda Lutz, Kevin Janssens,
    Vincent Colombe, Guillaume Bouchède
My colleague Dr. Sporgersi didn't like this movie very much. He didn't think it left any room for suspension of disbelief, and he's right about that. You can't believe any of it. It would be hard to even pretend to. The setting's a modern luxury house surrounded by what appears to be 1,000 square miles of desert. The main way to get there is by helicopter. A man and a woman have gone there for a weekend getaway, and then two of the man's buddies show up out of nowhere with their hunting rifles. They all spend an evening partying, and the woman, whose wardrobe leans toward short skirts and bikini bottoms, flirts with the men in a provocative way, and the next day she's violently assaulted and pushed off a cliff. She lands on a dead tree, where she's impaled on a sharp branch, and she's bleeding at the rate of a gallon a minute, but she frees herself by setting the tree on fire and crawls away, and the guys figure she can't get far with a tree branch in her gut, so they go back for their guns and vehicles and set out to hunt her down. They'd be better off catching the next helicopter out of there. It's pure grindhouse exploitation, primitive and outlandish, like "I Spit On Your Grave" dropped down into "Mad Max" territory, a film in which vengeance is served with plenty of gore, and you can track every character by following a trail of blood. Also, if you're out in the desert alone with a tree branch stuck through you, you can remove it by doing the surgery yourself with a hunting knife, a beer can and a hit of peyote. Which is good to know, I guess, if you're ever in that situation. Just don't expect much in the way of suspended disbelief.