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mexcine · 6 years

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The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017) review

I really liked Dogtooth (Kynodontas) and The Lobster, so I eagerly anticipated the new film by Yorgos Lanthimos. The Killing of a Sacred Deer is a very fine film with lots of Lanthimos lunacy, but...it's not as weird as the other two. Opinions will differ as to whether this is a positive or a negative development; I'm conflicted.

When I say The Killing of a Sacred Deer isn't as "weird" as Dogtooth or The Lobster, I don't mean it's conventional either in story or execution, but try this exercise: summarise Dogtooth, The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer in one sentence each, then look at what you've written. Can you imagine anyone else making these films? The answer is probably no, but The Killing of a Sacred Deer comes closest to conventionality.

The plot (have no fear, no spoilers here): cardiac surgeon Steven (Colin Farrell, wearing a bushy beard that makes him look like an old-timey desert rat prospector in a Western movie) is married to eye doctor Anna (Nicole Kidman); they have two children (Kim and Bob). Steven has befriended teenager Martin, whose father died while Steven was operating on him a few years earlier. Steven even brings Martin home to meet his family. Martin becomes more and more demanding of Steven's time and when Steven pulls away, Martin reveals his "plan"--Bob, Kim, and Anna will all fall ill, first becoming unable to walk, then refusing to eat, and finally bleeding from their eyes just before death. Steven has to choose which member of his family will die (or all will), in retribution for the death of Martin's father.

What do you know, first Bob, then Kim cannot walk, although there is no medical reason for their condition. They also refuse food. Steven and Anna (as yet unaffected, physically) try to reason with Martin, then threaten him, but in the end Steven is faced with a kind of Sophie's Choice.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer is leisurely paced (the film is just short of two hours, not counting the end credits) and takes its time getting to the big "reveal" from Martin, but even prior to that point there are definite signs that things aren't normal in this world. Set in a large midwestern city in the USA (most of the movie was shot in Cincinnati, Ohio), the outward trappings of Steven's life are calm and substantial. He and his family live in a large, expensive house (they even have a “typical” dog), the children seem well-adjusted and happy, Anna is a professional and also a homemaker, and Steven is a respected surgeon at a modern hospital. However, cracks in the façade appear: Steven is apparently a recovered alcoholic, his lovemaking with Anna is...non-standard, everyone talks in a rather stilted, overly polite manner (and yet are almost too frank in what they discuss). Steven's relationship with Martin is mysterious: how did they meet? Why does Steven give Martin expensive gifts? Why does Steven lie to his friend, saying Martin is Kim's classmate who's interested in a medical career? Is Steven having an affair with Martin? (No, although there are some uncomfortable moments which seem to hint at it) If he was, he certainly wouldn't bring Martin home to meet his family, would he?

Martin, excessively polite, ingratiates himself with Anna and especially Kim, although Bob doesn't seem that impressed. Martin brings Steven home to meet his mother, who--as odd as Martin--makes a strange pass at Steven, apparently with Martin's connivance. All of this occurs before Martin makes his death threat against Steven's family, creating an air of eerie expectation and uncertainty.

The second half of the film is somewhat more straightforward: there's a problem and a villain, how is the protagonist going to overcome adversity and triumph? Yet Lanthimos subverts expectations here as well, turning the story inward to focus on Steven, Anna, Kim and Bob, with Martin lurking around the edges but not playing a very active role in the denouement (even though he, somehow*, set it in motion).

*There is no explanation as to how Martin achieves his revenge. Is it magic? Or is he just a master manipulator who convinced Kim and Bob that they were going to fall ill? (The latter doesn’t explain the bleeding-eyes bit, though)

The Killing of a Sacred Deer has a distinctive style--perhaps it would be better to say, a mix of styles. Lanthimos alternates long fluid shots with giant closeups, standard cutting and narrative flow with disorienting flash-forwards (mostly in one sequence), and deadpan drama with black comedy and scenery-chewing melodrama. Lanthimos is an unconventional filmmaker, but he's also definitely capable of generating some Hitchcockian-style suspense--we've been told what's going to happen and (more or less) to whom, but when and how these things will occur are unknown.

The performances are all fine. Colin Farrell, who'd been in The Lobster, creates a different sort of character here, a kindly but controlling patriarch whose attempts to impose order on the world are thwarted at every turn by events beyond his control (albeit events precipitated by his own past flaws). Nicole Kidman's Anna at first seems to be subordinate to her husband, professionally and personally, but when her children's lives are at stake (and her own as well) she shows some steely resolve (then seems to back off in a curious bit at the climax). Barry Keoghan (who looked awfully familiar, then I realised he was in Dunkirk) is appropriately sinister with an obsequious veneer. The two actors playing the children, Raffey Cassidy (Kim) and Sunny Suljic (Bob) are also good, especially Cassidy: the naïve Kim falls prey to Martin's charms, despite her realisation that he's evil. The only other characters of significance are Bill Camp as Steven's medical colleague and Alicia Silverstone as Martin's mother (a one-scene appearance, but pretty effective).

The Killing of a Sacred Deer is, in the final estimation, a more "accessible" film than either Dogtooth or The Lobster, with several name stars (The Lobster had Farrell and some other known performers like John C. Reilly and Rachel Weisz, but no one of the star power of Kidman), an American setting, and a relatively straightforward narrative and premise. However, the film's style (and, a Lanthimos trademark, an open-ended conclusion) mark it as something out of the ordinary. It's not a reboot of Cape Fear or The Omen or The Bad Seed or Tomorrow the World or The Child (1977 version), although it has some aspects of them all.

I'd have to say that while I didn't find The Killing of a Sacred Deer quite as novel, shocking, and outré as Dogtooth or The Lobster, some of this reaction may be because I'd already seen the two earlier films and had thus been inoculated to an extent against being pleasantly stupefied by the eccentric Lanthimos filmic world. That doesn't mean The Killing of a Sacred Deer isn't an excellent film, one that’s well worth watching several times. Because it is.

P.S: If, like me, you don't care to see a giant closeup of actual open-heart surgery, you might want to keep your eyes closed for the first two minutes and 30 seconds of the movie.

#the killing of a sacred deer #kynodontas #dogtooth #the lobster #colin farrell #Yorgos Lanthimos #nicole kidman #evil child

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