Having watched three violent and at times brutal Australian movies back to back; I'm very concerned about what passes as entertainment and why these films are being funded and backed! Berlin Syndrome (well directed but just without any real purpose); Hounds of Love (just nasty and brutal) and now Killing Ground. Classic Aussie flicks like Picnic at Hanging Rock, Wake in Fright, even Road Games and Dead Calm, used the landscape or the road or the sea to evoke and create menace. These current films bludgeon (pardon the terribly violent pun) the audience and its often hapless characters with overt brutality and sadism, rather than finding more nuanced and creative ways to build a thriller or a horror movie; as the aforementioned classics achieved.
Killing Ground has a picturesque but ultimately menacing surrounds for its narrative to unfold. Using an interesting plot device of non linear sequences, the audience is edgy and unsure where it all is going; but once it gets there, it is simply unapologetic murder and torture. Why? I am most proud of the wonderful technicians and crafts men and women that the Australian industry has cultivated and continues to engender, but why so many filmmakers are drawn to this bleak content, escapes me. With so few local films making any money, more of these pointless schlock horror pieces, and there will be no industry to speak of!
OK, having got that off my chest, Killing Ground boasts an impressive female lead in Harriet Dyer (I first discovered her in Reuben Guthrie a couple of years ago). Harriet has great screen presence and I hope she continues to get some good roles. Although he plays an execrable loser, Aaron Glenane is very convincing and gives some real layer to this otherwise psychotic creep. The rest of the cast is fine, but really the cinematography and the clever editing make this film the tense and at times interesting visual experience that it is, but enough with torture and murder!
Killing Ground has a picturesque but ultimately menacing surrounds for its narrative to unfold. Using an interesting plot device of non linear sequences, the audience is edgy and unsure where it all is going; but once it gets there, it is simply unapologetic murder and torture. Why? I am most proud of the wonderful technicians and crafts men and women that the Australian industry has cultivated and continues to engender, but why so many filmmakers are drawn to this bleak content, escapes me. With so few local films making any money, more of these pointless schlock horror pieces, and there will be no industry to speak of!
OK, having got that off my chest, Killing Ground boasts an impressive female lead in Harriet Dyer (I first discovered her in Reuben Guthrie a couple of years ago). Harriet has great screen presence and I hope she continues to get some good roles. Although he plays an execrable loser, Aaron Glenane is very convincing and gives some real layer to this otherwise psychotic creep. The rest of the cast is fine, but really the cinematography and the clever editing make this film the tense and at times interesting visual experience that it is, but enough with torture and murder!