All right, all right. I mentioned it in yesterday's review, it fits with the theme and, at the time of writing this, it's still too hot out for me to go see The Strangers: Prey At Night at the cinema (being of Irish descent, I need something like that 5000 SPF sunblock from Robocop to be out in the sun safely). So let's look at that bane of the Australian Tourist Board, Wolf Creek.
The year is 1999. Two British backpackers, Kristy and Liz, have decided to carpool with an Australian man, Ben, as they travel through the Australian Outback. One of the first places they visit is Wolf Creek National Park, where there is a huge crater made by a meteor strike. While on the way there, Ben tells them stories of alleged UFO sightings and strange phenomena that are said to have occurred at the site of the meteor strike. Their trip there goes well, however, until it is time to leave and they discover that their car will no longer start. Faced with the possibility of being stranded there for an unknown amount of time, the trio starts to worry... until an apparent saviour appears in the form of Mick Taylor, a local pig hunter who comes across them and offers to fix their car back at his camp at an abandoned mine. However superficially friendly Mick seems, though, his true intentions are much, much darker, and the three of them soon find themselves at his mercy, bound and tortured. Will they be able to escape?
Wolf Creek pulls a nice little bait and switch with its first 40 minutes or so, with its slow build and talk of UFOs, and little touches like the trio's watches all stopping at the same time while they're at the meteor crater, to make us think that something otherworldly is going to happen. It doesn't work in 2018, of course, as everyone knows exactly what the film is actually about, but back when I first saw the film in 2005/6 with Nick I remember us genuinely not knowing what was going to happen. But it's still a clever little storytelling trick, making the audience think of more supernatural horrors when the real threat is far more down to earth.
The film also starts with a "This film is based on actual events" statement, and in this case it's truer than usual, as Wolf Creek borrows quite heavily from the accounts of what notorious serial killer Ivan Milat did to his victims - particularly the "head on a stick" - as well as the crimes of Bradley John Murdoch, although neither are specifically mentioned by name. The film proved so controversial, in fact, that the DPP of the Northern Territories asked that the film not be released in Australia until after Murdoch's trial, for fears that it would prejudice the case.
Wolf Creek's main success as a horror movie is down to John Jarrett, who plays Mick Taylor, because the way he plays him is very accurate and absolutely terrifying. People tend to have an idea in their heads of serial killers wither being silent stalkers or erudite gentlemen killers, when in reality they are superficially charming - just enough to get their victims to let their guard down - and then utterly brutal, cruel and, more often than not, misogynistic, and Jarrett plays Taylor like that to a tee. Apparently, Jarrett stayed in character between takes and improvised a lot of his dialogue - particularly Taylor's laugh, which he worked on for four months.
It's another quite bleak film as well, which again is probably not so much of a shock 13 years after its release; but at the time I first saw it before its reputation became known, several of the scenes were like a punch to the gut. The film makes us think it's travelling along the traditional slasher film road, with a Final Girl emerging to fight the killer and save her friends... but then it doesn't turn out that way and we're left reeling at what does happen. Again, this is also accurate serial killer behaviour, which is just so jarring when we're used to the Hollywood portrayals of them being theatrical and bombastic most of the time.
If there's a fault with Wolf Creek, I think it's with the way it handles Ben's ordeal. Yes, Mick Taylor's focus is on the females he captures and tortures and so his male victims are going to receive far less attention, but at the same time it almost feels like the film forgot about him until the very end, when we get his brief scenes before the movie ends. I also think that, while the revelation of just how many victims Taylor has had over the years is a good one, it felt a little too much like it was trying to pull at our emotions with the video of the family with the little girl. We're already horrified by what we've seen; dropping a child into the mix feels like cheap emotional blackmail. But those are minor issues, and ones that don't affect the film overall. It still ends about as bleakly as it could possibly do so without nukes falling or something similar, and it still stays with you long after you've finished watching it.