The Backwoods Reviews

Sometimes films just go too far in trying to be different. Occasionally this can be seen by horrible, "experimental" or "artistic" camerawork, improvised scripts or at worst, black and white scenes with übercontrast. Just something that attempts to differentiate the film in question from the others of it's kind. Backwoods (known as Bosque des Sombras for everyone who loves original titles) tries too hard in a different way. It's a film about two couples who go to Spain to a cabin to hunt some rabbits and stuff, they find a little girl locked in an abandoned house, then the people who locked her up come after her. That's what the film is about, but it tries really, really hard to deny that. Apparently director/co-writer Koldo Serra found that he didn't want to make a film that was essentially a slasher. The first half of the movie is essentially spent going through the very cliched marital issues the two couples have, and then they discuss some retardedly pseudopshychological stuff about hunting.

The second half is where this film goes over the top with just trying too hard. The men that come to the house after the main characters save the little girl, are in fact as follows: One young kid who constantly looks reluctant to the very idea of being there, one old man with very little hair and who looks sort of like Abe Vigoda, a fat rapist, and his brother or something who's just fat and doesn't attempt to tap any asses during the film. It's ridicilous. These people are never portrayed as threathening, whereas that's exactly what should be done in a movie like this. Instead Serra attempts to create sympathy towards those men. It's very obvious by the way they're portrayed that we're supposed to feel sorry for them. I just don't see why. The film never shows us why we should feel sorry for them, it just says "Have some sympathy, guy!" and even as the film finishes it never tells why on earth we should feel sorry for a group of men who probably spent a good 7-8 years having good old fashioned babysex with some infanft in a dark basement in the middle of the woods.

There's also another issue along with the villains. Backwoods attempts to look at the psychological effects of killing another person. I stress the word attempts, because quite frankly it fails miserably. What this psychological perspective means in practice is that after every kill, the camera pans over to the face of the murderer for a long period of time and then the guy who shot someone puts on their best acting job and tries to look real sad. And that's it. It's infuriating. You can not look at the psychological effects of murder just by showing us the face of the killer for a minute! When you want to do that, you need dialogue, you need actions, you need anything other than silent minutes spent looking at a camera. All that being said, Backwoods actually sort of works. When it tries, it can be intense. But it wants to be so much more, and it fails whenever it reaches for the stars. It's sad.

However, it does have Gary Oldman in it, and Gary Oldman WILL eat your fucking face.

The summary gives an accurate account of the story, so I won't get into it :)

Gary Oldman just looks way old in this film (like 80-90 years old, but he's not of course), the make-up artists didn't do much good for him! Considine's character is the only one that makes any sense and his instincts should be trusted; however, if they were, there wouldn't be a film...
Ledoyen's acting (or no-acting) is bad. The fact that the film pictures submissive women is annoying and bothering.

I honestly can't find anything that makes this film worth watching.

Auch Spanien hat einsame Häuser in weitläufigen, nahezu menschenleeren Wäldern, ideal also für einen Hinterwäldler-Horrorfilm. Das aus diesem Setting ein ganz ordentlicher Film (mit relativ wenig Horror) wurde liegt mehr am Regisseur und den Darstellern als an der nach Schema F gestrickten Story. Die Darsteller spielen ihre Rollen überzeugend, schaffen es jedoch nicht beim Zuseher Sympathie für ihre Situation zu wecken. Die Inszenierung ist flott und vor allem optisch gut umgesetzt, kann die Spannung, aber nicht die ganze Filmlänge über aufrechterhalten. Um wirklich aus der Masse der Horrorfilme heraus zu stechen ist der Film zu wenig originär spanisch, einsame Waldhütten und misstrauische Dorfbewohner findet man fast in jedem Land. Fazit: Eine handwerklich gut gemachter Film der trotz Gary Oldman nur ein Nischenpublikum finden wird.