A Bloody Movie Review

 "Revenge" (2017) starring Matilda Lutz and Kevin Janssens is a very well done, bad movie. I watched it on Tubi TV after seeing a recommendation from a couple people on the Bluesky, none of whom I know or follow. 

Now, it's only bad because of the story is one that you can drive a truck through at times without hitting any reality. I mean- the heroine gets pushed off a cliff and becomes impaled on a dead tree. That's not the end of the movie. She survives and quite well, all things considered. Well, not all things. Come on now- you get a tree branch- near as thick as a baseball bat through your guts- and survive, well enough to get around for 24 hours without medical attention? She heals herself and we'll get to that, but no. What's wrong with falling off the cliff and just getting knocked out and then coming to and running off? It's been done a thousand times is the answer to that. This gal sets fire to the tree to get out of the predicament. Props to that and the cinematography of her blood spilling on the ground like bomb on a battlefield scaring the bejezzus out of an ant. Very well done. Visually, this is a good movie because of things like that.

The reason she went off the cliff, I should mention, is her boyfriend pushed her. And the reason he pushed her is, his buddy had raped her. OK. Better to kill her than risk her reporting the rape to the cops. Right? See, all three fellas were married family men. This could be bad for the boyfriend as well as the rapist. They were supposed to be hunting. Who was this girl? Why was she there? Inquiring wives would want to know. There's no fault in the plot there. Humans are always killing for dumb reasons. I don't know why Trump doesn't have National Guard on everybody in the country. The coverup is worse than many crimes. If you kill anybody in this case, kill the rapist. But that doesn't solve the curious wife problem, and the police might frown on that too. Plus, these three men have scant little respect for women. They are friends. She was expendable. 

They are freaked out when she gets impaled on the tree and they are certain she is dead. The boyfriend is an alpha and he takes control. They will go about their hunting as if they knew nothing about it and then come back and take care of the body. It's not like she'll get up and walk away... She did and then they go out hunting for her in the desert. 

She kills the third wheel of the guys and gets his shotgun and supplies, all while still having the tree in her body. This is where it gets interesting. She finds a large cave. She has in her locket some crazy drug that her boyfriend had said was so powerful that a guy he knew under the influence of it cut off his own leg without feeling a thing. So, that obviously is how she manages to get the stick out of her tummy. She cauterizes the wounds (fore and aft) with a cutup beer can heated over the fire. This somehow leaves an impression of the can on her belly like a tattoo. It looks pretty cool and I'm not into tattooed ladies. I'll allow it, given the circumstances. It was more like a brand, like black fraternities do. 

The glaring error of this film seems to be the ridiculous amount of blood. An adult human body holds 10-12 pints of blood. The writer/director must think that's 10-12 gallons because these people leak all over the place! Very easy to track. Nobody bleeds out. That's kinda unrealistic. But that's a B-movie for you. The heroine is super cute and a damn fine actress to act all this brutality out. We get to see her bottom too! And you ladies (and maybe some fellas) might appreciate the male star has a pretty good dick, something you don't generally see in theatrical releases. In the final scene he is showering when she comes to kill him, and the guy does the whole scene nude. And bleeding...

All in all, a very well-done movie. I'll go with the 6.4 on IMDb. Bloody good entertainment.