Victim (2010)

You know, when someone direct messages you on Twitter saying "Check out Victim 2010' don't do it. If you do you might come across some king of monstrosity which might keep you up at night.

We follow...Young Man (Seriously, he's credited as that) (Stephen Weigand) who is kidnapped by Doctor Rudolph Volk (Bob Bancroft) and his ogre of an assistant Mr George (Brendan Kelly). What does Volk want with the Young Man? What exactly is Volk up to? And does it have anything to do with the video we saw at the beginning of the film?

This film, this film is weird. I can't really talk about the story without hinting at major spoilers, so I'll leave that till the spoiler section at the end. I will say that the acting is pretty good, in particular Bob Bancroft who managed to portray a very sinister individual. However, when he tries to express any other emotion, he tends to fall flat. Brendan Kelly can do particularly well as the mute Mr George, but he can't seem to get the right emotion from time to time. Stephen Weigand meanwhile, is pretty bad all round.

Then again not much is given with their characters, Volk is only interesting when in eccentric mode and we don't really learn much about Mr George or Young Man to really care. Hell, we don't even learn Young Man's actual name, nor do we know why George is helping Volk. Volk's motivation you sort of learn as the film progresses, but there is a big contradiction, again it'll come up in the spoiler section. In fact you care less and less about Young Man as the film goes on.

There is one other main character, Detective Janet Corwin (Stacey Haiduk) whose character is weird. She's there to provide hope for Young Man, but her interest in Volk seemingly comes out of nowhere. That and she is virtually bland, all we really know is she wants to go to Florida. Haiduk doesn't really seem to know what to do with the role, she just goes along for the ride really.

Actually for the story, I can say that I kind of respect where it goes, how it pushes the boundaries, but it doesn't really pull it off well. When Volk's objective is revealed, for a thriller film it really is downright disturbing. And with a short cast list there isn't the classic 'kill them off to raise tension', and Volk's plan goes along with hardly any problems so escape seems impossible.

But overall, it isn't exactly a good movie. For a large part not much happens, but the film does crawl under your skin. It's kind of like 'Twilight', there's a good concept, but it's held back by everything else. The acting is poor, the overall story is poor, not much goes for the film. Now for the spoilers.








Spoiler Section

Volk's objective to brainwash Young Man into becoming a woman. I am dead serious. And not just any woman, but his daughter. Why? Well, Volk's daughter was sexually assaulted, and Volk wants to inflict the same pain onto the person who did it.

And that works against the film because you get a feeling that Young Man was the rapist before it's even revealed, which makes it a lot more difficult to like the guy. Along with that, by the time Volk's master plan is about to be executed, it virtually isn't Young Man anymore, so technically Young Man isn't suffering the same pain, its this whole new personality that's suffering.

So, a bit of a flawed story, but really, it's a passable film. I'm not going to watch it again in a hurry, but it's passable.