The Boys [MA]

Drug dealer, Brett, has just gotten out of jail and is back in his suburban home amongst his mum and brothers. But not everything is as happy and serene as it should be. Someone’s been at Brett’s secrets stash, the neglected girlfriends of the boys are contemplating leaving, and above all Brett wants nothing more than a little revenge against the dickhead or who set him up and put him behind bars. 

I think this is loosely based on an actual crime that resulted in the perpetrators getting life sentences: never to be released. An edgy and truly unsettling look at the dark underbelly of suburban Australia, Rowan Woods’ The Boys is a very disturbing movie where the horror is beautifully achieved through the minimalist soundtrack by the Necks and the array of intriguing camera shots that make each scene more disturbingly memorable than the next. 

I mentioned Rowan’s use of the camera having a particularly incredible effect and it really does. The Boys was originally a play and to transfer something like a play into a new medium like cinema is not really an easy feet. Woods’ multiple array of shots all work seamlessly to create this disturbing flick. We’ve got a nice mezza plate of fast-moving documentary type shots, intensely held close ups, wide shots that look through multiple doorways and observes the characters from that angle, as well as these really sad and sluggish mid shots that reflect the melancholy of a lot of the characters, particularly the poor women. What’s great about the shots is how they are all incredibly reflective of the characters they’re depicting, especially the intensely held mid shots and close ups of Brett, visualising his hard consistency of character and pure evilness. 

The performances are all wonderful and incredibly emotive, but special applause has to go to David Wenham who reprised his stage role of Brett. Wenham brings horror to the Aussie twang in his intense and sweetly venomous dialogue, tone, and gestures. He does (more or less) everything with a gentleness that you can’t quite bring yourself to trust it, the real viper in the rosebush is he. 

Toni Collette stands head on with Wenham as his girlfriend, Michelle, and she proves to be one of the strongest women of the film; fiery and always ready with a grating remark. 

What’s clever about this movie is Woods’ way in which he chronicles its events. Flashforwards into the arrest and lead-up to the trial and sentencing are interspersed throughout the film, heightening the already-growing sense that something horrible is going to happen in the end. The use of these shots to the future intermingling with those of the present make Wenham’s last line of the film: “let’s get her” possibly one of the creepiest things ever, more than Leatherface, Patrick Bateman, and Judge Doom fused together! 

Starring Lynette Curran, John Polson, Jeanette Cronin, Anna Lise Phillips, Sal Sharah, Pete Smith, Anthony Hayes, and Sal Sharah, The Boys is a chilling piece of Australian cinema, more disturbing that your run-of-the-mill slasher flick. Whilst the incredible violence of everything is implied but hardly ever shown (including the crime of which the boys are convicted) the terror of this movie comes through its minimalist style and intense shots that create the tension and bring it to a boiling fever pitch before releasing it all with a quick fade to black. Filled with family, feuds, violence, romance, and drama, it’s truly disturbing and a classic example of Australia’s fascination with crime cinema.