Some movies
have implied violence. A man holds a gun up to a door
where on the other side of the door in an unsuspecting man not
knowing the danger he's in. The trigger is pulled.
We might not see the other man get his head blown off, but we
can allow our imagination to fill in the blanks. Some of
the violence is more graphic. Same scenario, but this time the
camera is on the other side of the door where we see the man
blown off his feet, from a distance, and we know he's
dead. Then there's Ryuhei Kitamura violence. Same
scenario, but this time we see the bullet explode into the
guys eye, bloody fragments and tendrils all over the place,
with this cat collapsing hard on pavement with a pool of blood
gathering under his disfigured head. Not a lot left to
the imagination there. But it's a movie, right? If
I want to imagine stuff I'll read a book. 'Midnight Meat
Trains' Ryuhei Kitamura's, 'No One Lives' is a movie that also
didn't leave much to the imagination. A film that is
pretty basic in presentation that fills in its blanks with
lots of style and even more bloody gore. For those of
you who like that kind of thing.
A girl is running through the woods. I mean she is
really booking it. We will learn her name is Emma and
the she is some kind of kidnapped heiress and she is played by
actress Abelaide Clemens who's some kind of athlete. Put
Emma out of your mind right now, but she will return.
Say hello to some dude (Luke Evans) who's name we are never
given, and his lady love Betty (Laura Ramsey). Amber
looks more like Dude's daughter than his love, but there are
reasons for that, even though Luke Evans and Laura Ramsey are
roughly the same age in real life. Regardless, they are
moving from where they were to a new place due to
circumstance. These two lovebirds stop off at a diner
for a bite to eat, but unfortunately they encounter a crazed
group of hillbilly home invaders… actually only one of them is
crazed in my man Flynn (Derek Maygar) who does not have nary
an ounce left of the good sense God gave him. The leader
of this band of thugs, Hoad (Lee Tergerson), seems like an
okay guy all things considered, but Flynn will invariably lead
these people to ruin.
So the Dude
and Betty were minding their own business trying to get from
point A to point B when Flynn the psycho runs them off the
road, and kidnaps them with the plan to torture them into
giving the gang whatever they have. This was one of the
worst moves in the history of everything because this Dude is
bad news. I mean this Dude is the worst news ever.
There is nothing positive about this guy… and worse is that
this psychopathic unfeeling monster of a human is terminally
pissed off at the moment.
Hoag and his crew are at their shack of a house, conveniently
in the middle of nowhere, and one of the rewards they have
from Flynn robbing this Dude is a little package in the car
that's potentially worth a lot of money. The Dude wants
his package back, and even if he didn't want the package back,
he still plans to kill them all. Horribly. Even
the people in the house who had nothing to do with anything
that was done to him are probably going to die. Because
he's the worst dude ever.
Ryuhei Kitamura is a master at this kind of thing. I've
seen a number of his Japanese films, including 'Sky High' and
'Godzilla Final Wars', and the afore mentioned 'Midnight Meat
Train', so this is a film director who has a clear vision and
has the talent to let the audience see exactly what he wants
them to see. This isn't to say I enjoyed 'No One Lives',
because I really didn't, but it is one slick, smooth, expertly
executed production.
It's not that I wasn't entertained by 'No One Lives' because I
guess there is some entertainment value in watching one set of
unpleasant people get eviscerated by someone way more
unpleasant, and in watching America Olivo take was has to be
longest shower in the history of cinema. Had the woman
got out that shower after she was clean, and not extended it
another fifteen minutes, she might still be alive. Or at
least alive a little longer. The bad guy probably killed
her because of her gross waste of valuable natural
resources. And again, it's not like this movie isn't
well done. Every impaling, gutting, gashing, and wood
chippering is well staged and crystal clear for all to
see. Plus the performances were okay, Luke Evans using
his soap opera good looks to maximum effect, Derek Maygar
taking crazy way over the top than anyone could imagine, but
we particularly liked the odd performance turned in by
Abelaide Clemens who scared and tough and clever all at the
same time.
The thing is… I felt no tension in this film. As a
horror movie, accepting that I'm probably not going to be all
that frightened at this point, I still want to feel uneasy and
at no point did I feel that way watching 'No One Lives'.
No, I was just kind of benignly watching people get brutally
slaughtered with no real feeling or emotion or fear or even
concern. That' brings up another problem, and while I
did like the fact that this is a horror movie with no real
'good guy', but this has the side effect of giving us a movie
filled with unsavory people, including Emma to an extent,
which means we have no real rooting interest in seeing any of
them survive. The Dude kind of came off as the hero, in
a way, of this piece. And we kind of wanted him dead
too.
So despite the slickness and presentation of 'No One Lives',
with the absence of fear and tension, and the desire to see
everybody in it dead… I'm not sure I can call that combination
a success.
