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Revenge

6/10

Stars: Matilda Lutz, Kevin Janssens, Vincent Colombe, Guillaume Bouchede

Director: Coralie Fargeat

If you care for bloodsoaked action movies with a total disregard for logic, you're on safe ground here. A trio of drug smugglers lands at a palatial house in the middle of the desert - although exactly what they are and where the desrt is located are matters unimportant to the plot.

With them is Jen (Lutz), mistress of the sullenly handsome leader Richard (Janssens). While Richard is away for a couple of hours, his colleague Stan (Colombe) corners and rapes Jen, while the third man (Bouchede) stands by.

Her protests to a returning Richard are rewarded by being called a whore and beaten to the floor. Rushing off into the desert, Jen is trapped above a ravine. Richard pushes her over the edge, and she is impaled on a jagged tree stump dozens of a feet below. It beggars belief that she should survive this, let alone be strong enough to seek revenge, but then we wouldn't have a film, so we must play ball with the director, who does do her best to validate the impossible.

Eating peyote, Jen pulls out the stake, cauterises the wound with red-hot tin plate and dispatches the first of her pursuers with a knife through the eye.

From then on it's edge-of-seat stuff and little wonder that the production team ran out of fake blood a number of times, even if, with only three victims for Jen to hunt down, the director can't sustain the suspense 100 per cent of the time.

A good climax is followed by a slightly enigmatic final scene. English and French dialogue with some subtitles.

David Quinlan

France 2017. UK Distributor: Vertigo. Colour by Panalux.
107 minutes. Widescreen. UK certificate: 18.

Guidance ratings (out of 3): Sex/nudity 1, Violence/Horror 3, Drugs 1, Swearing 2.

Review date: 11 May 2018