Glasgow FrightFest review – Violence
According to the blurb, Violence is set in an alternate 1980s – an alternate early 1980s, from the look of it – though it seems to be set more in a pocket universe based on the occasional film genre of stylised, self-enclosed urban underworld movies … Walter Hill’s The Warriors and Streets of Fire are touchstones, but see also 99 & 44/100ths % Dead, Trouble in Mind, Trigger Happy, Sin City, Tokyo Drifter and others.
The unnamed North American city of director-writer Connor Marsden’s debut feature seems to have only one cop – and he’s tied up being subjected to torture – and is ruled by club-running ganglord Jimmy Jazz (Joris Jarsky), whose empire is based on a drug called ‘red’ which looks like cayenne pepper. Rebels Charlie Rocket (Maddie Hasson) and Bats (Tomaso Sanelli) launch a strike against JJ by raiding a convenience store which is his big stash house (‘the Castle’) and he retaliates by setting Henry Violence (Rohan Campbell), formerly his best dealer but latterly aligned with the puritanical ‘straight edge punk’ movement, to get the drugs back and punish the raiders. Violence would be out of Jimmy’s power were he not still hung up on Charlotte Cola (Sarah Grey), a blonde he introduced to red who is now a doomed waif. Also in the mix are a fey rival ganglord (Greg Bryk) and a tough female enforcer (Jasmin Kar). All through the night, these characters revolve around each other in grimy alleys and underlit clubs, mostly engaging through – yes – violence.
For a supposed top film noir heavy, Violence gets overwhelmed rather often, sustaining injuries which ought to have him laid up for months but staggering on to the next betrayal, torture session or angsty moon about his junkie sweetheart. Campbell has been on a streak lately – Halloween Kills, The Monkey, Silent Night Deadly Night – and has a battered babyfaced charisma which sort of fits his punk dress-up (he’s the sort who has a ‘fuck’ tag attached to his jacket) and general air of cluelessness as Henry tries to live down his stupid hardbloke name while being batted between equally wicked factions. Yes, even the revolutionaries are duplicitous, murderous shits and you wind up sympathising with the band who clock that yet another fight is about to break out in the club and just opt to unplug their instruments and go home.
Made on the cheap, this more or less has to go for a scuzzier feel that Hill’s relatively lavish visions (let alone Seijun Suzuki’s sublime takes) and the ragged production design does give off the proper vibes … but even at a brief 82 minutes, it has its dead spots. At one point, Charlotte is told to ride the Vomit Comet, a graffitied all-night bus which just goes round and round as she succumbs to drugged sleep – and the film slightly too often puts the viewer in a similar spot.
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