Review of Red Hill (2010) by Tsubaki S — 01 Jan 2011

7 1/2 out of 10.

Well ,this was a pleasant surprise, I'd had heard good things said coming out of the Frightfest screening last year, and was hoping for a nice little tension piece. The film did not disappoint, as well as being a nice modern twist on a western staple, the initial half of the film lent some almost supernatural weight to the presence of Tommy Lewis's escaped convict Jimmy Conway.

There's some brilliantly setup sequences, and Steve Bisley chews up the scenery relentlessly as the hard nosed inspector of the district, playing up nicely against Kwantens stand up city cop. Kwanten has an easy affability here that fits into the cop / cowboy motif, and barring a couple of pacing missteps when his character is pushed to the side of events a little frustratingly, watching this solid revenge drama unfold was great fun.

There's twists and turns along the way, a nice bit of symmetry that's revealed in the finale, but it's a solid movie set in a great locale that knows it's ground and wastes little time getting there. All in all, the sense of isolation, the clearly rendered archtypes, clean and concise action sequences, along with the huge shadow the formidable Conway represents, give this the film the feel of vintage John Carpenter.

There's moments that could have been capatalised on more fully, and an odd little red herring that's a bit throwaway, but it's a low budget gem whose heart is very much in the right place.

Australia still thrives with low budget and inventive genre cinema, and this is one of it's best examples of recent years. Well worth your time, if you enjoy any of the parts that make up it's whole, be it revenge, crime, thriller, or western.