taxicabaldwin Review of Beast of Burden

Beast of Burden (2018)

Feels more like a student film (Minor Spoilers)

[5/10 · 17 April 2018]

Having just watched this with my family, I commented at the end that it felt more like a student filmmaker's thesis, as opposed to a full-length feature film. After reviewing the director's bio, I think that comparison can be safely made. The director, Jesper Ganslandt, is a Swedish film maker whose credits to date consist of 3 music videos for the Swedish pop/dance group Alcazar; 2 short films; a semi-autobiographical film (Falkenberg Farewell) in which the director and other cast members portray people with the same names as the actors,and which takes place in Falkenberg, Sweden (Mr. Ganslandt's birthplace); a documentary about an unknown Swedish topic; and 4 feature films, including this one. With that in mind, the film was fairly well acted, in my opinion. I found Sean's (Daniel Radcliffe's) reactions to be fairly believable, given his circumstances and relative helplessness, while DEA agent's are typical of someone who's trying to climb the corporate/bureaucratic ladder (not caring who gets hurt in the process), and Mallory's actions are those of someone who's just carrying out a job (Mallory is an "troubleshooter"/assassin for a third group). Mallory has been tasked with kidnapping Sean's wife, Jen, to ensure "compliance. He's not sadistic about it, although it would have been easy to write him that way; instead, he's cool and professional, calmly informing Sean of what will happen to Jen if compliance is not met. I did have a few (minor) quibbles with the story though, even keeping in mind the looseness of the plot. First, I disagreed with the simplistic ending Mallory meets at Sean's and Jen's hands; instead of simply drowning Mallory; use the last 2 bullets in your gun (received earlier) to SHOOT the SOB!!! Sean and Jen end up bum rushing Mallory and holding his head under water; how often have we seen "death" faked that way? If you're close enough to hold his head under water, put those last 2 bullets in HIS HEAD and MAKE SURE he's not faking!! Also, the final scene is one where Sean's watching Jen and a toddler (who the audience is led to believe is their daughter) cross the street to meet them in an unnamed location. Without spoilers, how did they get there, where IS "there", and how did they finance this move? I felt this ending left the story open to a future (hopefully better written) sequel.