Review of Wilderness (2006) by Deb S — 02 Nov 2008

Wilderness is a brutal thriller/horror movie. A bunch of violent young male inmates are sent to an isolated island, after one of the interns commit suicide. It appears that the young cell-mate felt forced to take his own life, due to the constant, aggressive harassment that he used to suffer from his fellow inmates. The boys run into 2 girls and their own warden from another detention center. Testosterone fuelled male inmates can't help but make advances to the opposing female camp. Neither of the two wardens are very happy about each other's group being there, but when one of the boys is found dead, they band together to fight for survival after getting picked off one by one by a mysterious and ruthless killer with a crossbow, a pack of attack dogs and a skill for booby traps.

The characters are a sorry and tiring bunch that you couldn't care less about. Sure they're not meant to be likable, but hell they really irritated me.

The movie has something for every fan of the genre; beheadings, vicious forest traps, mauling, being eaten alive, crossbows, knife fights, skinheads, near drowning, the list goes on. I cannot recall the last time I saw a movie so openly graphic in terms of dismemberment and human death. Maybe there wasn't enough violence or action for you, but it was more than enough for me.