Essential Killing
Polish author and film from a tight premise own action feature films, “Essential Killing” by Jerzy Skolimowski is not always good to assemble the puzzle pieces in spite of its final thrilling and relevant. An exercise in style, simply.
From the desert to snowy regions. A man without an identity (Vincent Gallo) is a fugitive. He was captured a first time for murdering soldiers and he was able to take to their heels. Since it is on the run with the keys to his squadron. To stay alive, it is ready for anything …
“Essential Killing” is a puzzle that the director is happy not to explain, using some returns in time to further obstruct the view. Who is this man running relentlessly? What does he want? Why does it work well? Questions that are deliberately left in the mist which the viewer will make its own history in his head.
Perhaps it is a tragic figure, a martyr, a reincarnation of Jesus. Or simply someone who has been brainwashed by a terrorist group. Having accomplished his mission, he can wander, killing everything that stands in its way, like this man became wild beast or monster.
This topic that piques curiosity is quickly inflated by a multitude of scenes muscular, violent and explicit, as if it were a new episode of Rambo. The antihero becomes a fugitive and there is no question for him to be back alive. The race for survival is now in pain, that just express the director as a realization hellish and stressful, where the game almost continuously on the image and the sound manages to create a true state of hypnosis.
These stylistic effects are however not sufficient to divert attention for very long. Misunderstanding rumbles and it becomes a little bit boring, especially during these rehearsals that seem only to delay the conclusion. By dint of being opaque, the story loses its appeal, its impact. In wanting to join the commercial cinema and that of art-house, the result is likely to displease both to each other only.
Especially since the creator’s approach ends up being pretentious. As if Skolimowski (an experienced director offered nothing essential since 1982) wanted to return, decades late, the work of Antonioni, playing some subtle metaphors (the fact that practically nobody speaks echoes the misunderstanding that may exist between different religions) and supported symbolism (blood that has stained the innocence of Snow White and the horse, this plant happens to grow despite the hateful atmosphere).
The only person who can get out heads held high is Vincent Gallo a physical game that offers the highest caliber. His performance, remarkably, allowed him to hand over the award for best actor at the last edition of the Venice Film Festival. He knows how to suffer in beauty, which is ultimately the state of the moviegoer in front of this unclassifiable, which has the potential to mark so indelible marking minds, but who leads by excess.
