While on a trip to find and photograph some long-lost tribal art in the Australian outback, one of a group of six friends becomes infected after some ill-advised skinny-dipping and regresses to a primal state. As their escape options begin to reduce, the surviving members of the party have to resort to increasingly violent and desperate measures and ultimately face a “kill or be killed” dilemma.
*****
Primal won an audience award at Frightfest 2010 and it certainly has elements that you can see fans of this sort of thing enjoying – ripped out throats, cannibalism, violent deaths, sentient tentacles, slimy mythical creatures, more violent deaths, a machete – the question with this sort of film remains, however, obstinately the same: is it any good?
It is only fair to acknowledge that for a film with such obviously exploitational elements as this and accompanied by serious budgetary limitations, Oscar nominations were never going to be within its reach or aspirations. Having said that, it should be assessed on its merits and taken on its own terms. As befits a film such as this with an 85 minute run-time, the set-up is economical. A “12,000 years ago” prologue establishes that something bad is lurking there, we then meet the six principals in the present day, driving into the remote jungle to try to find the tribal art-work needed for Dace’s anthropology paper. Anja is set up with a convincing dose of claustrophobia and before you can say “are you sure that’s a good idea?” Mel has taken a swim in the lake, lost her teeth, grown some scary new ones and started trying to eat everyone.
The splattery effects are well-enough executed and although there is an annoying repetitiveness about Mel shrieking, leaping at people, getting clobbered and running off again, the gradual closing off of the rest of the group’s escape options is believably developed, even if Mel’s boyfriend Chad is a complete wimp, idiot and annoyance, who you just cannot wait to see the end of. I don’t think it is too much of a spoiler to say that Anja must eventually face and overcome her claustrophobia, in the course of which we enjoy (if that’s the right word, which it likely isn’t) the film’s most affecting, unsettling and disturbing scenes and gain some measure of understanding of the nature and purpose of the evil lurking in the jungle.
Most of the shocks and jumps are obvious and predictable, though there are some genuinely effective jolts towards the end. The principals are mostly (and presumably intentionally) irritating and although that helps us feel less troubled by their assorted unpleasant demises, it does also prevent any real engagement with the film or sympathy with the characters’ plight. Perhaps the film-makers never concerned themselves with such lofty ambitions and were happy to produce something (1) gory, (2) scary and (3) messy. If so, they managed 1 and 3, falling short for the most part on 2.
Not a very good film then by the usual critical benchmarks (acting, direction, pacing, narrative, script) but effective enough as a violent and blood-soaked throwaway title. If you like the sound of that, then you can catch Primal on DVD and Blu-ray at LoveFilm from 28th February 2011. You can watch the trailer here, but be warned on two fronts. Firstly it is NSFW by any stretch of the imagination (think red-band on Red Bull) and secondly it spoils pretty much every significant surprise and plot element the film has to offer.
[Rating:1.5/5]
DVD Extras: TBC.
