Eden Lake
(2008) 91 min.
Rated: R (Gore, foot impalement, stabbings)
Country: UK
Director: James Watkins
Starring: Kelly Reilly, Michael Fassbender
Links: IMDB | Wikipedia
Rating: ★★★☆☆
A couple decide to rough it near a lake and come across some delinquent teens.
Synopsis:
Jenny (Reilly) a teacher and her boyfriend, Steve (Fassbender),take a trip to the English countryside. They spend a night at a crappy inn and continue their trip to a once pristine lake, that now is part of a new construction site. Once passing they fence they drive up to the lake.
They find a quiet boy studying insects. He ignores them and they leave him alone. As Jenny and Steve enjoy the day by the lake a group of delinquent kids arrive. Their dog harasses Jenny by barking at her and they play loud music. Steve asks them to turn it down and they ignore him. Steve, however, is determined not to be bullied into leaving and stays at the lake.
Eventually the kids leave and night falls on the lake. Jenny and Steve decide to camp out. Jenny hears noises outside and Steve goes out to investigate. He returns and scares Jenny and they spend the night in peace.
The next morning, however, they find the food is infested with insects and decide to leave. The car runs over a bottle and it cuts the tire deflating it. Steve fixes the tire and they are off.
As they head into town Steve sees the delinquent kids and tries to intimidate them with his car, but he can’t follow them into a path. At the cafe he asks the waitress about the kids and she tells him that it can’t be their kids. Steve drops the subject and they continue breakfast. Afterwards, he spots some bikes in a yard and is determined to say something.
Steve enters the house of a stranger and looks for the kids. The father of one of the boys comes home and is about to go upstairs to yell at his son, but Steve is able to escape being seen by getting out of the house through a window.
The couple return to the lake and enjoy most of the day there. Jenny then notices the beach bag with the car keys is gone. The couple return to where the car was parked and find the place empty. They begin to walk down the road and their car comes zooming at them almost hitting them.
They keep walking and night falls. They find the kids around a campfire. Steve insists on confronting them. He finds the kids kicking at a badger in a cage. He asks the kids for his keys back. The leader denies it. Steve’s phone goes off and he starts to attack the kid. Another of the teens pulls out a pocket knife and Steve takes it away. Their dog lunges at them and Steve manages to stab the dog and kill it.
The leader is upset and throws the keys away. Jenny gets the keys and urges them to go. Steve finally listens and they race to the car and try to drive off. The kids are running after them. They throw rocks at the car, cracking the windshield. Steve manages to drive off, but cannot see because of the cracked windshield and broken headlights. He hits some brush and is pinned under a heavy tree branch. He urges Jenny to run off and get help.
The next day Jenny finds the abandoned car and follows a trail of blood to Steve tied to a stump with barbed wire. Group leader Brett is still angry that his dog is dead. He chokes Steve in anger but is stopped by his fellow group member. Brett forces each one of the boys to stab Steve, cutting him deeply each time.
Jenny manages to pair a GPS device with Steve’s phone and tries to dial for help, but Brett sees the call and rallies the others to look for her. While they’re away Steve frees himself. Jenny and Steve reunite in the forest. They manage to find a small shack where Jenny nurses Steve’s wounds. She finds a ring he was going to propose with. Steve is bleeding from a large gash in his side. He’s shivering in pain and grows weak.
The kids come around and she hides with Steve in the water, when they leave she pulls him out of the water. Steve is so weak he can barely stay conscious. Jenny vows to get help and puts on Steve’s proposal ring. As she’s running she steps on a giant spike that pierces her shoe and foot. She can’t remove the large spike other than pressing it through her foot entirely.
The quiet kid from earlier in the film finds her and she asks him to guide her to town. Instead, however, he guides her to a clearing and texts the other boys to show up. They knock out Jenny.
She wakes up to find herself tied to a stake with Steve who is now dead. She’s been splashed in the face with gasoline and Brett is making the quiet kid light the fire. The rest of the group look on shame. The fire burns at the rope binding Jenny and she’s able to run away.
Brett threatens to burn the quiet kid if she doesn’t return. He pours gas on the kid and sets him on fire.
She runs until she finds a map near a dumpster. She breaks the glass and takes the map, but hears some boys approaching. She hides in the dumpster and waits until they pass. Next another boy walks up to her and she stabs him in the neck with a large shard of glass. She regrets her actions and cradles him as he dies.
Night falls and everyone is basically running around in the dark. Some of the kids find the body of the younger boy who was stabbed by Jenny. Brett beats the crap out of one of the other boys for wanting to call for help. Jenny runs out into the street and falls in front of a car which stops for her. She gets inside but realizes soon that the guy is the brother of the kid she killed and he doesn’t intend to go back to the town.
When the man stops at the gate and gets out, Jenny steals the car, accidentally runs over a girl from the group and makes it into town. Once in town she crashes into a parked car and stumbles upon a party. She asks them for help and they take her to the living room couch. Soon the party gets a phone call about the deaths in the woods and Jenny slowly realizes that she’s in Brett’s house. She hides in the bathroom and arms herself with a razor, but she is overtaken. They believe Brett’s lies and blame Jenny. The father of the household takes Jenny back into the bathroom and closes the door. Jenny’s screams can be heard behind the door. Brett goes to his room knowing he’s won and puts Steve’s sunglasses on.
Review:
Movies about reckless and dangerous youth have been done almost since the golden age of cinema. Untamed youth who kill people on a whim and who get themselves into increasingly more and more trouble. The dangerous kids have been beatniks, biker kids and gang members. This film follows in the same footsteps and amps up the blood and guts.
This film also somewhat reminded me of Funny Games, except that Steve’s character kind of went out of his way to try to put the kids in their place and Brett wasn’t going to have any of that. Instead of going to police about issues, Steve tried to deal with them himself, putting himself and his girlfriend in danger.
With sort of mixed signal, this film carries on preaching about how dangerous kids can be, on the other hand it’s punishing the victims and the perpetrator goes unpunished. Violence begets more violence. What a revelation. Yes. Thanks for the message, movie.
There is a sort of classism in this movie. All the bad kids seem to be lower class and poor. Jenny and Steve seem to be middle class. The leader, Brett, comes from an abusive home and bullies the other kids which gains him respect among his peers. All the adults of these kids dismiss their behavior and ignore the problems with a shrug.
The movie also repeatedly wants the audience to believe that Jenny will ALMOST get away and then take her right back into danger. That somewhat made it predictable. After she was captured, it was just going to be a cycle. And in that way it was somewhat like Funny Games. No escape and a villain who kind of winks to the audience at the end.
These type of films are probably my least favorite and I feel not as clever as the writer/directors hope it to be.