You know, if I were a less level headed, upbeat and all round peaceful kinda guy titles like this one would bug the crap out of me. During the whole film not one corpse is spat on, nor grave p!ssed on. If you're gonna have such a great descriptive name, you damn well oughta make something more of it I say. Though to be fair I Spit on Your Grave featured no grave spitting as it's actually called Day of the Woman, but if it hadn't had the name change it might never have become such a success. This one shoulda just been called Fun Times With Emily Haack or something, because that's exactly what it is. She plays Sandy, who runs afoul of a boyfriend escaped from jail and ends up going hilariously off the deep end and inflicting some pretty nasty stuff on a few luckless scumballs. She may not match the unhinged nightmare vigor of the likes of Christie Wiles but still turns in an engrossing performance and happily gets nekkid a couple of times. She looks a good deal hotter than she did in Scrapbook as well (maybe the change in hair color) and since I thought her pretty lovely in that one its a real bonus. As one might expect this isn't what one might term a "good" film, though it is interesting in its way, putting forth its notions of hereditary madness and brutality, of the incendiary eroticism of sexual violence, the catalysts that send someone over the edge, and its revelry in the idea of female as aggressor. It has been argued that the whole idea of female dominance is just a roundabout way of asserting male control in that it siphons female power into fantasy (and as a fan of femdom porn I wouldn't necessarily disagree), so its nice to see here a woman getting to be really pretty savage in a technically unarousing manner even if I did find it more amusing than shocking (I have a weird sense of humour). The film does little to actually explore any ideas but its still nice to see them there. What's not so nice is the way the film feels padded even with its trim runtime. Too much time spent with the camera woozily exploring a churchyard and its interior which could have been better spent on more depravity. Still, when things are moving they really move, with some fun grue and a number of classy eyebrow raising moments (with a broom handle put to especially good use). Although this one is held in generally lesser regard I found it a better watch than Scrapbook, faster, tighter and more engaging if not as grimly potent. 7/10 from me, though I suspect most will be far less impressed.
Review of The Captives
