Helmed by Bristol sound co-founder Geoff Barrow, this scabrous if undernourished first film casts a critical gaze on 90s rave culture. Venal drug user David (Marc Bessant) first robs an unconscious dealer, then in a later recollection tries to break into his own family home. Before you can say, he's overturned in the wreckage of his car in a woodland – and subject to the wrathful eye of the Poacher (Sleaford Mods frontman Jason Williamson). Declining to free David, with impatience toward city dwellers, he is broken Britain embodied: “You’re one of those noisy cunts from up on the heath.”
Unsteady Opening and Grimly Amusing Confrontation
The film begins uncertainly, lingering excessively on pedantically chronicling David’s attempt to extricate himself from his safety harness, while awkwardly transitioning into flashbacks of his normal activities. The bigger point – that the ecstasy generation were mainly focused on themselves – is firmly made. But these brief episodes are insufficiently developed to properly prime us for what to expect when the Poacher turns up, fuming after David strangles his dog. Still, a grimly amusing duel takes hold – David desperate to escape; the Woodsman withholding his jerrycan of scrumpy, intent on soaking him instead in resentful talk. Williamson, exuding ponderous menace in the role, is evocative of Michael Smiley.
Visual Flair and Music Video Sensibility
Just a single important plot development, but it results in a hilariously staged rampage on the forest trails that veers toward folk horror. Filmmaker John Minton at last unleashes with his ostentatious visuals: where he was hunkered down doing artful shots of bugs in headlights in the early stages, he now lets rip with the full lysergic grand display, accompanied by a wild organ version of Ravel’s Boléro. The movie resembles an elongated music video than a complete narrative, but there’s enough strident imagery to suggest that Minton could emulate Jonathan Glazer, Garth Jennings and others into making the leap from the Brit music promo scene.
Game releases in British and Irish theaters from 17 November.
