Sriram Raghavan’s Badlapur recently opened to critical acclaim and a knockout box office – it is one of the first Hindi films to transcend the revenge tropes.
The best revenge thrillers are the ones that shake up the genre, below are five of the most brutal ones from around the world:
1. THE VENGEANCE TRILOGY by Park Chan Wook
The single most popular revenge series to grace the planet, Park Chan Wook made himself a household name and a film buff God with the hattrick of Sympathy for Mr Vengeance, Oldboy, and Sympathy for Mrs Vengeance. All three films are pitch black, beautifully written, poetic in their brutality and a film geek’s intro to Korean cinema. The beauty of the trilogy is that it not only stands the test of time, but also can be watched in any order and it will still blow you away.
2. BLUE RUIN
With razor sharp pacing, a smart script, and a fantastic cast of newcomers, director Jeremy Saulnier’s indie film represents the best the revenge thriller genre has to offer. The film takes familiar elements of a revenge story and approaches it with less emphasis on the sensational and more on the moody and surreal atmosphere of vengeance. Those with a fondness for no bullshit crystalline thrillers will find themselves richly entertained by the film that explores the theme of grief driven violence with exceptional grace.
3. I SAW THE DEVIL
A man’s wife dies and he sets off to look for her killer. If the other films in this list placed a hero seeking righteous kill, the protagonist in this impossibly vicious Korean thriller is as violent, uncompromising and mirthless as the villain. After a point it becomes difficult to believe that the antagonist deserves more punishment. The film is directed by Korean horror maestro Kim Jee Woon and features his signature chilly camerawork. Not to mention a knockout performance from Choi Min-sik (of Oldboy and Sympathy for Mrs Vengeance). This film was (illegally) remade into the terrible Ek Villain last year.
4. KOKUHAKU (CONFESSIONS)
This Japanese movie seals the fact that no one makes hair-rasingly effective revenge thrillers like the South East Asians. Japanese director Tetsuya Nakashima’s film puts the most unlikely antagonist, a school kid, against another unlikely vengeful protagonist, a school teacher in a blazing death match. Violence against kids in cinema is unsettling in itself, but violence against kids by a school teacher, because the kids are murderers themselves takes the taboo cake. There’s enough genuine tension and imagination in the film to fuel the barrage of shocks and visceral chills.
5. HARRY BROWN
Michael Caine played the butler of a Bat-costumed vigilante in three films. Little do people know that he himself has played a vigilante in this striking British revenge thriller by Daniel Barber. After the murder of his friend Caine’s aging character goes on the hunt to teach the youngsters responsible a bloody lesson. The moody atmosphere renders a sense of the apocalypse in the film, but the violence is given heft by a real soul in the narrative. It’s depressing in a few ways, but also challenging and intelligent cinema, and it moves in unexpected directions.
(Mihir Fadnavis is a film critic and certified obsessive movie geek who has consumed more movies than meals)
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