HUNTER HUNTER Review
Finding itself among the pile of lackluster movies with inexplicably cool titles, HUNTER HUNTER from director/writer Shawn Linden is a patient work that observes the violent pitfalls of slumming it out in the woods. While it tries its best to craft a slow burn depiction of backwoods paranoia and violence, the unrelenting brutality of the film’s final act hopes and prays that the viewer will think all of the wheel spinning in the previous 80 minutes will be worth it.
And boy, do those wheels spin. In the remote wilderness, Linden positions his story around a family living astray from civilization by choice. For reasons undisclosed, patriarch Joseph (Devon Sawa, fully transitioning to gruff mountain man) has plopped his wife Anne (Camille Sullivan) and daughter Renee (Summer H. Howell), into the depths of the untamed forest, where they spend their days simply surviving. Scrounging and hunting for food, carrying water from the nearby rivers, holding disdain for reintegration into society, the family (in particular, Joseph) commit to their unique way of living even as Linden hints at a growing resentment building between Anne and Joseph due to the former’s worry that their daughter deserves a life that is more than just hunting and gathering. At only 90 minutes or so however, HUNTER HUNTER has little time to flesh these family members’ relationships out as the meat of the tale arrives in the invisible threat of a wolf, nay, The Wolf, coming into their backyard.
Held with mythical reverence (but also fear) by the family, Joseph takes it upon himself to once and for all kill the beast, leaving his wife and daughter to fend for their home in the meantime as he treks into the sea of trees. Already the member of the family least comfortable in the wilderness, Anne spends the hours watching the dark edges of the forest with terrified suspicion of facing whatever may come out of it. So of course, once the heavily injured Lou (Nick Stahl) arrives at her front door, seemingly fleeing from something in the forest, Linden lights the fuse of tension that will unexpectedly climax with savage violence.
Splitting his tale into two different perspectives — Joseph on his hunt for the canine predator, Anne being forced to protect her home and daughter — Linden creates an interesting structure to his story that sadly never connects. In fact, in what could be considered a twist itself, Linden focuses more on Anne’s increasingly taut situation, letting Camille Sullivan effectively depict the plight of a woman currently at the mercy of the dark wilderness around her. As the only character who shows an ounce of growth, Ms. Sullivan makes for a surprising and capable central anchor even as her daughter is kind of just there and Joseph really just gets to act as the film’s patented “rugged and stiff” survival man, which to his credit, Mr. Sawa succeeds at surprisingly enough. For the most part, HUNTER HUNTER looks to keep its secrets close to its chest, introducing red herrings and side plots (including the focus on two local cops slowly becoming entangled in the central story) that tease terrors both supernatural and natural (and perhaps even human, in the role of Stahl’s fidgety guest of honor). But as with other films that appear to deal with supernatural or inhuman forces, HUNTER HUNTER is content to once again remind viewers that there are other things to be scared of in the woods besides mysterious wolves and starvation.
Once you realize where the film is going — and from the way things ultra-violently play out in HUNTER HUNTER’s finale, Linden seems to operate under the assumption that viewers will get where he’s going with things long before it actually gets there — there’s not much else to gain anything new from this film. For the most part, the filmmaker has better luck creating tension on paper rather than in execution as most scenes and story reveals just kind of happen with little to no build up. With no build up, the film’s events feel like slapdash sequences moreso than natural progressions. Due to the lack of tension, the film’s gory finale where consequences and unmitigated anger run free never really feel anything more than mean-spirited; a last grasp at memorability from a film that doesn’t really stick out. On a visceral level, with all its yelling and skin peeling, it works (thanks to some seriously gnarly makeup effects); but at best, HUNTER HUNTER’s final scenes feel like nothing more than a violent lesson on the dangers of forest dwelling.
For his third feature film, HUNTER HUNTER is far from a failure; in fact, I could see a future where this film shows up on other’s “underrated/underseen” lists. Even among its faults, Shawn Linden bares a ferocious tenacity in telling a story all the way to its bitter end and there’s something to admire in that. In his next outing, whatever that looks like, I hope the filmmaker can seamlessly navigate through his dense forest of ideas to effectively evoke the terrors they hold.
2/5
