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‘Landmine Goes Click’ – This 2015 Revenge Thriller Channels Classic Exploitation Movies

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landmine

Levan Bakhia doesn’t have a lot of credits to his name, and his only other directed movie so far is the sauna-set thriller 247°F. Yet before taking his indefinite leave of absence from filmmaking, Bakhia left the world a disturbing parting gift. His 2015 movie is strictly for fans of disobedient storytelling. Set and filmed in the Georgian director’s homeland, Landmine Goes Click combines a high-concept plot with the brutality of vintage Grindhouse and exploitation movies.

While the country of Georgia has made a conscious effort to clear landmines left over from wartime, there is always going to be the chance that one was overlooked. And unfortunately for the three characters in Landmine Goes Click, they found it. Newly engaged couple Daniel and Alicia (Dean Geyer, Spencer Locke) and their best friend Chris (Sterling Knight) are backpacking somewhere out in the Georgian countryside, near the mountains and several hours away from the closest town. There is an unspoken tension between the three friends, but it’s only when one of them steps on a landmine does the truth come out and destroy their relationships.

Similar to 247°F, this movie also centers on desperate young characters stuck in an unusual situation. However, Landmine Goes Click could have simply focused on the immediate dilemma — Chris can’t move until help arrives — but Bakhia didn’t aim for a straightforward thriller this time around. No, he crafted a story with three distinct acts, each one more depraved than the last. The first part looks to be a standard survival drama until a foreshadowed plot twist changes everything.

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The movie mutates into something grimier as Chris and Alicia’s secret finally blows up in their faces. After revealing the two had a dalliance in the past, it becomes more and more likely that Chris stepping on the mine wasn’t an accident. The confirmation comes soon enough, and while it isn’t surprising, it is a good sample of the kind of vileness this tortuous movie has in store for its viewers. Those initial fifteen minutes may seem tense and hopeless, but they will feel like a picnic compared to the remainder of the story.

The next act is where Landmine Goes Click starts to go to dark places. As Alicia tries to save Chris, a local named Ilya (Kote Tolordava) and his dog show up out of the blue. Ilya, whose actor passed away shortly after this movie was released, fools the audience into thinking he’s more inept than dangerous. At first Ilya plays up his oafish act, grating on both yours and the character’s nerves with his repeated obtuseness. Like in the previous chapter, though, looks are deceiving; Ilya is more calculating than he originally let on.

Bakhia was wise to not revolve the story around Chris and Alicia’s original predicament; there isn’t enough there to sustain an entire movie. This is also one of those cases where the involved characters are only interesting because of their bizarre problem. Without the mine here, Chris and Alicia aren’t compelling. Meanwhile, the introduction of Ilya keeps the movie feeling fresh and interesting, not to mention unpredictable. When it seems like Landmine is losing its focus and going nowhere during Ilya’s arrival, though, the last scene of this middle act pays out. The camera stays on Alicia during her excruciating and prolonged attack, forcing you to look at her and absorb every second of her pain. 

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There is no time to shake off the queasy feelings incurred by watching the previous act. Immediately the movie moves on to what looks to be a much needed cooldown period, but it’s actually the inevitable fulfillment of a threat made earlier. Landmine Goes Click channels the lurid revenge flicks of yesteryear by having a certain someone deliver karmic retribution after biding their time. The story trades the open outdoors for a cramped house, where a home-invasion scenario in the vein of Funny Games plays out with dreadful results. In lieu of fear caused by an intimidating culprit, one who is undermined by their own overdone performance, the victims’ medley of desperate pleas, wailing and hysteria makes the conclusion frightful and agonizing. The emotional add-on is something else to consider — the high cost of revenge — though it comes across as too hurried.

Bakhia runs a tight ship, rarely allowing for any significant downtime in the story. He knows how to keep people’s attention as well as test their endurance. The movie’s glaring lack of plausibility could be a deterrent to those who seek that, but here the emphasis is on extremes. There is no moderation or realism to be found. Landmine Goes Click is one long, cinematic shock button that averts credibility and embraces transgressivism.

Landmine Goes Click isn’t for everyone, and even the most hardened viewers might find themselves unsettled by what they see. However, if you miss the unapologetic style and execution of classic exploitation filmmaking, this thriller is a step in the right direction.


Horrors Elsewhere is a recurring column that spotlights a variety of movies from all around the globe, particularly those not from the United States. Fears may not be universal, but one thing is for sure — a scream is understood, always and everywhere.

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Paul Lê is a Texas-based, Tomato approved critic at Bloody Disgusting, Dread Central, and Tales from the Paulside.

Editorials

‘The Company of Wolves’ at 40: One of the Most Underrated Werewolf Movies Ever Made

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There’s a compelling idea in anthropology that many ancient werewolf legends are derived from our species’ need to rationalize the more animalistic side of humanity – which is why lycanthropy has historically been used to explain everything from medieval serial killers to cannibalism. While I personally think there’s a lot more to unpack when it comes to tales of wolfmen and women, this is still a great example of why so many of our most enduring fairy tales involve big bad wolves.

And in the world of film, I think there’s only one feature that really nails the folkloric origins of werewolf stories, namely Neil Jordan’s 1984 fairy-tale horror classic, The Company of Wolves. Even four decades later, there’s no other genre flick that comes close to capturing the dreamlike ambience behind this strange anthology, and that’s why I’d like to take this opportunity to look back on one of the most underrated werewolf flicks ever made.

The Company of Wolves was originally a short story contained in the 1979 anthology The Bloody Chamber, a collection of deconstructed fairy-tales intended for mature readers penned by English author Angela Carter. With the book quickly becoming a hit as readers became fascinated with its subversion of classic folk stories and (then) controversial feminist undertones, it was soon transformed into a duology of BBC radio-dramas which adapted both The Company of Wolves and Carter’s reimagining of Puss-in-Boots.

These radio-dramas soon attracted the attention of then up-and-coming Irish filmmaker Neil Jordan, who decided to meet with Carter to discuss expanding on her stories and bringing them to life on the big screen. The duo soon realized that a single short story wasn’t enough material for a feature-length film, so they decided to adapt all of Carter’s werewolf tales into a single anthology.

With a completed script and a $2.3 million budget, Jordan decided to tackle the project like a hybrid between a theatrical period drama and a schlocky monster movie. Effects-heavy creature features were a hot commodity back in the ’80s, with films like The Howling and An American Werewolf in London proving that there was an audience for horrific lycanthrope transformations, so the director soon recruited a team that could turn this odd collection of feminist folk stories into something commercially viable.

Not exactly a great pick for family movie night.

Shooting would eventually take place almost entirely within the England-based Shepperton Studios, with notable production designer Anton Furst (who would later be known for his work on Tim Burton’s Batman films) helping to bring Jordan’s vision of a darkly romantic fairy-tale world to life. Appropriately enough, production would also involve a real pack of trained wolves (as well as a collection of dyed dogs), though extensive puppetry and animatronics were also used to flesh out the more gruesome parts of the flick.

After a grueling nine-week shoot where budgetary constraints led to corners being cut on props and costumes, The Company of Wolves was finally released in September of 1984 – just in time for spooky season. In the finished film, we follow the strange dreams of a sulky teenage girl named Rosaleen (first-time actress Sarah Patterson) as the film unravels an Arabian-Nights-inspired tapestry of both familiar and not-so-familiar stories about big bad wolves.

From sexually charged cautionary tales to parables about female empowerment, this surreal collection of deranged bedtime stories is much more than the creature feature that the marketing initially suggested. Like a more horror-oriented version of Jim Henson’s Labyrinth, The Company of Wolves exudes that same kind of hormonal teenage energy that transports us back to a time when the world was both scary and exciting in equal measure.

That’s not to say that this is an entirely pleasant experience, however, and I’m not just talking about the film’s horror elements. A big portion of the flick’s overtly sexual moments involve the then 13-year-old Patterson coming to grips with her blossoming womanhood and the dangers of predatory men (usually marked with a humorous unibrow), something that naturally makes for some intentionally uncomfortable viewing – especially in the year of our lord 2024.

Obviously, I don’t think it’s my place to dissect (or even judge) the effectiveness of the film’s commentaries on being a young woman, but even as a man I can still appreciate the thought and care that went into crafting this Jungian cocktail of serious themes in a genre-movie package that almost certainly went on to inspire future werewolf movies like Ginger Snaps.

Not the worst wedding I’ve been to.

That being said, what really keeps me coming back to the film is the absurd amount of memorable imagery. From a wedding party being taken over by canines to lonely treks through snowy groves, this is exactly the gloomy world I imagined as a child when reading Grimms’ Fairy Tales – and the dreamy atmosphere is only enhanced by the movie’s overall theatricality.

This also extends to the effects, as it’s easy to forgive decapitated dummy heads and ripped rubber skin when everything is happening in a magical hyper-reality, with a great example of this is being the scene where Grandma’s head unexpectedly explodes like a porcelain doll when it’s knocked off by a wolfman. That’s not to say that the effects are bad, as several of these transformations are downright grisly and likely influenced future lycanthrope effects like those in Underworld and even Trick ‘r Treat (even if the wolf-dogs here often look more cute than scary).

Of course, these aren’t the only things that The Company of Wolves has going for it, as the main trio of Patterson, Micha Bergese and the late, great Angela Lansbury exceptionally bring these exaggerated caricatures to life and the orchestral score is an absolute delight. I also really get a kick out of that bizarre ending implying that the dangers of adult life have literally come crashing into Rosaleen’s bedroom.

The Company of Wolves may not be a perfect film, suffering from some wonky pacing and the classic anthology problem where some stories are clearly much more enjoyable than others, but I’d argue that the flick’s iconic visuals and powerful thematic throughline more than make up for any minor flaws. And while we’ve seen bigger and better werewolf films since then, when it comes to adult-oriented fairy-tales, this is one psycho-sexual journey that is still worth revisiting 40 years down the line.

The Company of Wolves

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