Neil Labute's fascination/understanding of what compels ordinary citizens into acts of pure evil was certainly explored in his first two films, In The Company of Men and Your Friends & Neighbors. Though both incredibly good, these movies ultimately suffered from Labute's theatre background, the fact that he staged the actors as if they were on a stage. In Bash: Latterday Plays, his instincts are appropriate, because it is a stage play: one is not distracted by bland blocking, allowing for full participation in a quietly horrifying hour and a half. The tales told here are rife with concepts that befit Labute's dramatic tastes -- pedophilia, hate crimes, the killing of one's child -- but never before has he, as a writer, accounted for more jaw-dropping plot twists. Like a triptych of O. Henry stories adapted by Todd Solondz, Bash demands that you like (or at the very least, pity) each of its characters, and it promises that they will each betray you.
Review of Bash: Latter-Day Plays
