Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Writer: Yorgos Lanthimos, Efthymis Filippou (Screenplay)
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Colin Farrell, Alicia Silverstone, Barry Keoghan, Raffey Cassidy, Bill Camp, Sunny Suljic
Plot: Steven, a charismatic surgeon, is forced to make an unthinkable sacrifice after his life starts to fall apart, when the behavior of a teenage boy he has taken under his wing turns sinister.
Runtime: 2 Hours 1 Minutes
There may be spoilers the rest of the review
Verdict: Not Sure!
Story: The Killing of a Sacred Deer starts as wee meet surgeon Steven Murphy (Farrell) who has a friendship with Martin (Keoghan) whose father died on his operating table. Steven has his family, wife Anna (Kidman) and children Kim (Cassidy) and Bob (Suljic) with their own dreams at home.
As Martin starts to become overly attached to Steven, he starts to find a way to force himself into his life by befriending Kim, while Bob becomes sick with no explanation to what is causing his problems. It isn’t long before Kim gets sick too, this pushed Steven into trying to find out what Martin has done to make this happen, giving him the option to save his family.
Thoughts on The Killing of a Sacred Deer
Characters – Steven Murphy is a surgeon, he has years of experience and a family, but when the son of one of his patients starts getting to involved in his life, he must look into his past to save his family. Anna is the wife of Steven, she starts to go in his case to learn the truth in a way to hopefully save her children from whatever has been done to them. Martin is the son of a patient who died on Steven’s table, he starts by striking up a friendship only to show a sinister reason for the friendship which puts Steven’s family in danger.
Performances – Colin Farrell brings us another good performance, it does feel like he does just continue to use the same style of performance that he gave us from The Lobster. Nicole Kidman is good in this role using her beauty to get what she can from her character. Barry Keoghan continues to make an impact on the business this year after Dunkirk, he gives us a haunting performance as Martin.
Story – The story follows a doctor whose life comes crashing down around him once the son of a former patient comes into his life. We see how the actions lead to Steven needing to make a difficult decision, one that would change his life, but we are mostly left to see just what is causing the actions to happen, the true motivations behind it and just what he wants.
Horror/Mystery – When you look at the horror side of the film we get moments of disturbing behaviour, which is the mystery behind everything that just keeps us interested in to where the horror could go.
Settings – The setting doesn’t do too much for the film, we don’t seem to be located in any locations which makes a true impact on the film.
Scene of the Movie – The elevator.
That Moment That Annoyed Me – The almost pointless dialogue.
Final Thoughts – This movie is weird, this is the understate of the year I think, it has random dialogue style, moments that just seem random and most importantly keeps us wanting to know what the hell is going on.
Overall: Too strange for the casual viewer.
Rating
Movie Reviews 101 