Tag Archives: Kill List (2011)

Suspiria, giallo cinema & the lure of the sensory: An interview with Alexandra Heller-Nicholas

Posted on May 9, 2016 by Andrew Nette| 1 Comment

Suspiria 3Alexandra Heller-Nicholas is a Melbourne-based film critic and academic, specialising in cult, exploitation and horror film. Her books include Rape-Revenge Films: A Critical Study, Found Footage Horror Films: Fear and the Appearance of Reality, and most recently Suspiria, on Italian director Dario Argento’s 1977 film of the same. Alex kindly agreed to talk to me about her new book, the phenomena of witches in film and the ongoing fascination with giallo cinema. And a warning, unless your film collection is as good as hers, it will be hard for you to get through the following interview without making a lengthy list of films you’ll want to locate and purchase.

Drink-&-CameraAlex, You open the book with a playful but terrific quote from US film critic Joe Bob Briggs, that Suspiria is ‘the Gone With the Wind of Eyetalian horror’. You call it ‘one of the most breathtaking instances of the modern horror film’. Why is Suspiria such an important movie, not just in the context of Italian film cinema but horror cinema, generally?

If you forgive my turn to the colloquial, Suspiria is at its very core a film that sincerely does not give a fuck about what a film is ‘supposed’ to be: this manifests in a spirit of true experimentalism, a genuine love of ‘art’ both as a general concept and the very materiality of cinema itself.… Read more

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Posted in Giallo cinema, Horror, Peter Strickland

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Kill List

Posted on January 30, 2012 by Andrew Nette| 1 Comment

As a rule, I’m not a big fan of horror genre mash up films, and have found nearly every one I’ve watched, lazy, predictable filmmaking.

But Kill List is very different.

My test of a good a film is whether I can remember any of the plot the next day. I saw Kill List over a week ago and I’m still thinking about it.

Particularly the ending, that’s really stayed with me

Kill List is the second film by English director Dennis Wheatley. His debut offering was a particularly nasty little feature called Down Terrace in 2009. It concerned a housing estate family of low level drug traffickers who kill each other off to eliminate what they believe is an informer in their ranks.

While it had its moments, Down Terrace felt like it was taking the piss a bit too much for my tastes, sort of Mike Leigh as psychopath.

Kill List opens with army veteran Jay (Neil Maskell) fighting with his Swedish wife Shel (MyAnna Buring). They experience many of the same problems faced by married couples everywhere, money problems and disagreements about how to discipline their kid, that kind of stuff.

On top of that Jay’s got a few mental and physical health problems as a result of the botched hit he and his mate Gal (Michael Smiley) did in Kiev.… Read more

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Posted in Ben Wheatley, Crime film

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Kill List and three other upcoming crime films I have to see

Posted on November 9, 2011 by Andrew Nette| Leave a comment

It was a long wait for Drive, the subject of my last post, but well worth it.

Drive is not the only crime film I’ve been waiting for with anticipation. There are several others, headed up by the 2011 British film, Kill List. I’ve heard nothing but good things about this film and am still kicking myself I didn’t realise it was included in the Melbourne International Film Festival earlier this year.

Ben Wheatley, who did Down Terrace in 2009, directs Kill List. Down Terrace is the story of a family of low level drug runners who, almost literally, devour each other in an orgy of paranoia and violence as they attempt to unmask what they believe is a informer in their ranks. It is genuinely disturbing viewing.

The main characters of Kill List, Jay and Gal, are a couple of Iraq war vets and semi-professional hit men who take a contract to eliminate a list of three people. The movie starts off as traditional hit man story and then gradually morphs into a tale of horror, with a distinct Wicker Man feel to it

I’ll say no more. Check out the trailer here:

Madman Films has picked up the film and there is word they intend to give it a mainstream release here in Australia some time in 2012.… Read more

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Posted in Ben Wheatley, Crime fiction and film from Thailand, Crime film

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