Coralie Fargeat’s aptly-titled rape-revenge film caused quite the stir on the rounds of genre festivals last year, and has also had the honour of its own UK tour thanks to Birds Eye View’s Reclaim the Frame series. Revenge is a rape-revenge film made by a woman, which I suppose might, for some, make it a feminist coup from the outset. I’m not sure I’d go that far, but it is easily one of the best rape-revenge films for some years now, that manages a nice balance between unsettling some tropes and satisfyingly bloody vengeance.
French millionaire Richard (Kevin Janssens) arrives by helicopter at a lavish desert house with his American mistress, Jen (Matilda Lutz), in tow. The couple plans to spend a couple of days together before Stan’s friends Stan (Vincent Colombe) and Dimitri (Guillaume Bouchède) arrive so the men can have their annual hunting trip. But Stan and Dimitri arrive a day early, and spend an evening drinking with the illicit couple. The next day, all three men leave Jen for dead after Stan rapes her. However, they soon realise that Jen has survived, and the hunters become the hunted.
Revenge is a very stylish film and that extends to its depiction of its heroine. She is a socialite, seemingly in this relationship with Richard for the lifestyle – we’re not told enough about her (or him) to understand if there is some deeper connection between them other than he’s rich and she’s hot. His wealth is as objectified as she is. Beyond that superficiality they’re not unlikeable, as such, but there’s certainly not much depth to them. The way the first ten minutes or so of the film plays out, just them and a big house reminded me more of a video for a David Guetta tune than a film – she walks around in her pants a lot, he watches. When his friends first show up, for a while it plays out the same, but knowing the genre we’re in it doesn’t take much to see where things are going. It’s not so much Fargeat’s leering gaze at Jen that’s subversive in the film, but that Jen is depicted as comfortable with being the subject of that gaze. She dances for the men when they spend the night drinking, and her identity is closely tied, arguably entirely so, to her looks. This seems like a challenge to our sympathies, a trigger to the ‘but she was asking for it’ crowd. That Jen is comfortable with being looked at is not the same thing as consent, quite evidently.
What’s refreshing in the film, in considering it in its broader genre context, is that the rape scene is remarkably short – I Spit On Your Grave it really, really ain’t. However, what it does incorporate very well is all the other verbal traumas that a man might inflict upon a woman – from Stan’s ‘seduction’ of Jen, wherein he tries to convince her to have sex with him despite her clear opposition to the idea, through to Dimitri ignoring the rape while it’s happening and Richard blaming Jen for her own assault. Revenge may have a relatively short rape scene, but the traumas inflicted upon her are numerous – not least of all the trauma that results in her being left for dead by the men.
So, the film is primarily comprised of the revenge aspect of the narrative, and gosh, is it good. The film doesn’t shy away from getting bloody, and its success really rides on its all-in approach to gore. The bloody effects are glorious, and the vengeance set-pieces delivered with aplomb by an increasingly badass Lutz as Jen. Anything less – or less convincingly done – and things perhaps might not have been quite so entertaining. Jen becomes almost goddess-like in her vengeance – there are many, many instances of unsubtle symbolism in the film – and it’s an enjoyable depiction of the super-human qualities that female characters often seem to take on in these films. Considering the small cast, the second half of the film doesn’t really lose steam, and despite the film’s long run-time.
For all its more unsubtle elements, the film does also have something interesting to suggest about the commodification of people. When Stan and Dimitri first arrive at the house, they view Jen through the coloured glass of a floor-to-ceiling window, which frames her like a doll still in its box. She’s repeatedly referred to as irresistible, and, in the film’s climactic scene, Jen and Richard battle it out while a crass infomercial for a home shopping channel plays on a loop in the background. There’s something to be said, I think, for the close link then of Jen to Richard’s wealth, and the way in which that informs his ‘love’ for her – and his claim to her bodily autonomy.
Fargeat’s strong script and visual flair make the film, I think, and Lutz’s performance as the steely Jen is memorable – less so the male characters, but I think that’s essentially the point. The soundtrack is one of those ubiquitous synth jobs that genre films have at the moment, but the sprinkling of Bangalter in its Carpenter-eseque sounds makes it memorable. Revenge is a film well worth checking out if you’re after a film that’s fresh and wildly entertaining, but not entirely brainless.
Revenge is released to digital HD VOD in the UK on 7th September, from Vertigo Releasing.