Jon The Blogcentric

DISCLAIMER: I know we’re well into December and the VIFF ended almost three months ago, but I have been too busy with work and my part-time courses. They all left me with no time for me to finish my blogging. Now I have the time and I aim to finish my last five VIFF blogs over this next week.

Violation is another Canadian-made feature I took an interest in. Especially since it’s part of the Altered States slate of the VIFF. That film is definitely something else!

The film begins with a woman and a man alone in a cabin. They appear to be ready to engage in something sexual. Even something kinky and involving bondage. The woman ties the man’s hands up and he is excited for what he thinks he’s going to get. He’s waiting for it, but instead she hits him hard across the head and he’s unconscious.

The film then flashes back to the beginning. Miriam is a woman on the edge of a divorce and with a new boyfriend, Caleb. She goes on a getaway with her younger sister, Greta, whom she hasn’t seen in years. The getaway is in a cabin by the lake just outside the woods and joining Greta is her fiance Dylan. The getaway looks to be a good time to relax and reunite with family members.

However all that changes one day. Miriam decides to sleep for awhile during the daytime, but Dylan enters in for more than just a visit. You can tell that Dylan violates her by the mere image of her eye and her look of horrific shock.

Returning back to after Miriam hit Dylan, Miriam has a lot of cleaning detergents and tarps. It’s clear she wants todo more than just kill Dylan. She assumes Dylan is already dead after she first hit him across the head, but even with Dylan’s face covered, Dylan regains consciousness. She has to kill him, and she strikes his head again and continues until he’s sure he’s dead.

It doesn’t end there. Miriam now has to dispose of Dylan’s body. Trying to do that is very hard as she will have to decapitate him and saw off his body… and clean everything up so it’s all unnoticeable. She even has to have his body drain of blood above the bathtub. She does that with immense difficulty. She then saws off his head and legs and wraps his whole body in a tarp. After all that, she takes his bagged body and burns it to the point it’s nothing but ashes blowing in the wind by the lake. It may be over but Miriam is not the same. You can tell as a Russian couple are arguing nearby a shore and she interferes to tell the man to leave his wife alone. The look on her face at the end says it all.

The film then flashes back to before the whole murder and disposal happened. Miriam and Greta are out for a carefree swim on the beach. They get into good conversation about memories, but Miriam has to tell Greta the truth about Dylan. Miriam tell her but Greta does not believe her. In fact, Greta gives her a reaction of betrayal. The film ends with the look on Miriam’s face just before she’s about to commit the murder.

Right before the film was about to begin, one of the VIFF emcees said that the directors are known for making films of uncomfortable viewing. This film has a lot of uncomfortable things about it. First off being a rape, then a murder during a sex act, then a dismemberment. It does give you the impression that these filmmakers want to do some unwatchable elements Lars von Trier may have not tapped into. The rape wasn’t graphic, but we get a sense of what’s happening by the sex sounds of Dylan and the wide-eye of Miriam. The dismemberment was very graphic. I wondered how on earth they were able to get a realistic-looking fake body to do the scene. The first attempt at murder was graphic as well as the successful second attempt.

Actually the scene where Dylan thinks he’s about to have sex with Miriam was quite graphic. When I saw the erection, I wondered if it was real or not? I’m no prude, but I’ve always considered an erection on film to be the stuff of porn. So when I saw that scene, I was thinking “I hope that’s a dildo!”

The film attempts to tell a story of a woman who’s a victim of misogyny and plots her revenge. The film shows how the whole incident changed her. You can tell as she reacts when she comes across a Russian couple arguing after she finished with the murder. I’m sure misogyny and men who act as sex predators is a major message of the film. However I think the film mixes things up in the storytelling. You’ll notice it’s not chronological from start to finish. It’s a lot like Pulp Fiction where it goes from one time period of a story to the next and mixes it up in various scene. This film does the same thing too. However the arrangement of the story seems like it didn’t make sense to have one scene one place and another scene one place and to have the image of Miriam before she commits the murder at the very end. I don’t think the placements were well-placed. I get the ending, where they show the look on Miriam’s face and it showed a person irreversibly changed, but I think placement of sequences could have been better.

Despite its flaws, one of the film’s best storytelling qualities are the various filmshots. The rape scene is only scene through the eye of Miriam. That image and the sounds accompanying are all you need to know to get the message. The overhead shots of the lake area aren’t just picturesque scene shots. They’re also shots sending the message that anything can happen in the remote outdoors. The scene of Dylan’s ashes all in the air and around the lake area send the message that Miriam is leaving it all behind. And by leaving it all behind, it’s everything: Dylan, sister Greta, Caleb, and especially the life Miriam once led.

This film is a very good work for directors Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer. They have written and directed many short films before and some shorts together. This is the first feature length film for both as writers and as directors. It’s flaws are noticeable, but it definitely succeeds as an ambitious work. I strongly believe I will see better from both of them in the near future. Madeleine also does an excellent job in embodying the character with both the emotional and psychological transitions throughout the story. This is a story she co-wrote so it makes sense that she knows the character inside out. Outside of the role of Miriam, there weren’t too many other roles that were well-developed. Anna Maguire’s role as Greta was the only supporting role that showed any depth. Jesse LaVercombe’s role as Dylan was too two-dimensional as the predator who appears charming at first. The additions of the music of Andrea Boccadoro and the cinematography of Adam Crosby add to the film.

Violation has won awards and earned nominations at many Canadian film festivals. Directors Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli have received the most acclaim with the Emerging Canadian Artists award at the Calgary Film Festival, a Rising Stars award at the Toronto Film Festival, a Best Canadian Film nomination at Toronto, a Best Canadian Feature Nomination at the Montreal Film Festival and a Discovery Award nominee at the Directors Guild of Canada Awards.

Violation is a story about being violated by a predator and getting revenge. However it’s a story that’s not put together the best and ends on a confusing note. Hard to make sense what the film was trying to be.