One of the great things about film festivals is the sheer range of films you get, even though most of them might be loosely assembled in one particular genre or other. Horror in particular has a broad remit and can veer from terrifying in one incarnation to hilarious in another, without dropping any of the expected qualities such as peril or the fantastic/improbable. Why Don’t You Just Die! leans very heavily towards ‘splatstick’, playing largely for laughs. It takes place almost entirely in one setting with a limited, but larger-than-life set of characters and wears its heart very much on its sleeve, splicing cartoonish levels of ultraviolence with darkly comedic characterisation and a steady supply of comeuppance for its worst offenders. It skirts very close to the improbable or impossible in terms of what characters can physically withstand, but you quickly park your common sense and enjoy where the film is taking you.
Matvey (Aleksandr Kuznetsov) is just dropping by his girlfriend Olya’s parents’ apartment for a visit. They haven’t met yet, but mother Tasha (Elena Shevchenko) immediately swings into hostess mode whilst father Andrey, a detective, although rather more standoffish, at least seems like he’s trying, in his gruff way, to be friendly. That is, until he notices that Matvey has a hammer sticking out of his back pocket, which he claims to be lending to a friend later. This naturally sets alarm bells ringing; well, it would, wouldn’t it? This excuse is of course untrue: actually, it’s one of the few dishonest things Matvey really does, although he has indeed come into the apartment with the intention of killing Olya’s father, based on something she has recently revealed about her childhood. It’s a murder planned for noble intentions in its own way. Only wanting to help her, and acting entirely at her behest, Matvey attempts to get the better of Andrey – isn’t able to – and so the film’s energetic, grisly sequence of fights, stand-offs and reveals begins to kick in. Believing Matvey to be in his apartment for a whole other reason, Andrey takes the first opportunity to panic, going straight for a stash of illicit cash he’s concealed; as the film progresses, we learn where the cash comes from, and why it could be Andrey’s undoing. None of which interrupts the grisly violence for long…
There is a real host of unsavoury folk here, with the possible exclusion of Matvey and perhaps Tasha, who doesn’t seem to have a lot of options open to her: Andrey does an excellent turn as a well-loved, well-established but essentially corrupt police officer, a man who has passed on his tendencies to serve himself first and foremost to his daughter, the incredibly blasé Olya ( Evgeniya Kregzhde). Thise who have been caught up in Andrey’s machinations may have come off badly, but weren’t massively moral in the first place – though it’s hard not to feel some sympathy for Andrey’s old partner Evgenie (Mikhail Gorevoy), whose life has disintegrated since his dodgy dealings with his old partner. However, the film doesn’t dwell too long on emotional trauma, other than for a light gloss of ‘you reap what you sow’: it’s really more about a rapid rotation of double crosses and revelations, with the graphic violence being quick-edited and layered on for kicks.
You could probably tie yourself in knots trying to link the corrupt farce at the heart of Why Don’t You Just Die to some wider point about modern Russia, but all told, I think it would be a shame to waste a film which is clearly going for the fun approach to electric drill torture. Perhaps there is something there distinctively Russian in here, but this is just as much of a splatter movie as it is a satire, and one is far more available to us as viewers. At just 29 years of age, director Kirill Sokolov is certainly one to watch and as a first feature, this deserves to get him hired again and quickly. Why Don’t You Just Die looks great, is colourful and inventive, and moves at just the right pace without ever outstaying its welcome.