Hounds of love review imdb
To be fair: only a naive horror fan would expect fair play from the makers of a film whose main subject is a girl who's been chained to a bed. Who could like these people after we've seen their victim's wounds through such an exploitative lens? Young also rubs the violent acts that the Whites' commit in viewers' faces by lingering on wounds and the whites of Cummings' eyes on just long enough for us to suck in our breath and tsk-tsk the Whites for their crimes. Young treats us to close-ups of the offending pieces of scat, and boy, let me tell you, these things are not dry, innocuous pieces of waste. He throws a fit whenever he sees that their dogs have defecated inside the house. They've been through some hard times together and are apparently still going through them, given the girl they've got locked up in their guest bedroom.īut while the Whites are evidently not your typical kill-for-no-reason degenerates, they're also frequently defined by their abject behavior. He delivers a long speech when she questions that bond, and reminds her-in a wounded, ostensibly concerned tone-that he has done and would continue to do anything for her. John and Evelyn love each other, in their way. And John is in debt to a knuckle-dragging local thug who is clearly too intimidating to be drugged and chained to a bed. Evelyn is a divorcee, and is happy to be with John because he saved her from another dysfunctional relationship. While this is happening, John stares at Vicki. The meaning of this gesture is clear: I have you where I want you, and I enjoy dominating you.īut soon after this scene, Young asks viewers to start seeing the Whites as conflicted screw-ups. Young then goes for broke and has Evelyn lustily fellate John right after they chain Vicki down.
#Hounds of love review imdb movie
This is Horror Movie 101: the friendly couple you meet in the middle of the night is only as proportionately nasty as they are initially nice-seeming. But Vicki never makes it to her appointment because she's predictably drugged, and then chained to a bed. It's almost as if Young were working off of a check list of slasher film cliches: Evelyn seduces/disarms Vicki by offering her everything from a lift to booze before Vicki toddles off to a party. This is during the part of the film where we hold our breaths and wait for our generic expectations to be confirmed and John and Evelyn reveal themselves to be unfathomably cruel. At first, Evelyn and John seem normal enough.