Who is on the Ben Wheatley´s Kill List?

Seems like everyone…

Last evening screening at the Poly cinema in Falmouth turned out to be a very interesting meeting.

Kill List is getting quite a lot of attention in UK these days. So I am really happy that it was screened in here, so I could see why it is so popular with my own eyes. And big plus goes to the Poly cinema, because they gave us a chance to talk to the director Ben Wheatley too. Nothing is better than a regular screening accompanied by the people who made the film.

I had no idea what the movie was supposed to be about. I kind of didn’t want it spoiled and sometimes it is just good not know much about the film. And as it turned out, that was a very good decision.

Director Ben Wheatley turned out to be an interesting person too. I like it when directors can reasonably answer questions about their films, when they can completely explain the reason they made it that way. His answers were very honest and interesting, and they really made me think about what he said and how it applies to the movie.

He also said that this was the first and last time he has shot the drama. I can completely understand him. Kill List is too depressing. It really gore and violent, but if you are already used to it  (and watched enough Trier or Chan Park-Wook films or saw Haneke´s Funny Games), it´s not that bad. I would compare it to the Nicolas Winding Refn Drive. Drive was also full of blood and violent scenes (and famous beating scene from lift pose as a very realistic presentation of violence in a quite aesthetically stylish movie), but it was for a reason. In this film violence feels strangely real, sometimes it even hurts looking at it, but it belongs there. You can’t have a movie about hit man without blood. Kill List is definitely an interesting film. Depressing and full of blood and violence, but on the other hand, also offers Mike Leigh like portrayal of a one extraordinary family. Maybe may only problem with this movie is that it tries to be everything – family drama, krimi genre, horror, buddy film, black comedy. However, in the end it works. Because this movie meant to raise all those question and doubts. Because that is exactly what Ben Wheatley wanted from his audience. Same reason why he also banned all questions about the plot before the screening started. He wanted to raise the questions and let us hang there, and then end the film without answering them. He is just one of those directors, who likes to play with their viewers.

And in the end I have to say again, it worked. People talked, people wondered, and they kept talking about Ben Wheatley´s Kill List all evening – trying to find answers to his questions.

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