Writer: Casey Lee

Writer Ratings:
Overall:
Cast:
Plot:
Effects:
Cinematography:

Watch this if you liked: "Face/Off"

While its title may suggest a bloody affair, "Killing Season" starts out to be more than the nail biting and teeth grinding revenge thriller that it sets itself to be, but instead walks down a sloppy path that could lead to a deadly fall.

The movie opens with a worded montage on the 1992 Bosnia-Serbia War where genocide of civilians raking up to scales never seen since World War II were recorded, that resulted in the armed interference of NATO forces in 1995. When a group of American soldiers liberates a camp of Bosnian prisoners, they summarily execute its Serbian caretakers out of disgust of their deeds towards their prisoners.

Back in present day Belgrade, a strangely bearded Serbian (John Travolta) walks into a bar and pays for a file containing information about a Colonel Benjamin Ford (Robert De Niro), before telling his informant that he is going on a hunting trip. Meanwhile, in the tranquil Appalachian wilderness, Ford carves a quiet life in his cabin, spending his days chopping firewood and reading Hemingway beside a cozy fireplace decorated with wildlife trophies; content to live off the grid with no cell or computer and miles away from civilization or his family.

When a forced supply run leads to an unsuspecting meeting between Ford and a lone traveling Serbian decked for a camping trip, their relationship turns from distrustful to camaraderie, that the Serbian, introducing himself as Emil Kovac, extends an invitation to Ford to join him on a hunting expedition the next day.

While their start to a beautiful friendship does go down a bloody path that can be gratifyingly excruciating to watch like chugging down a mountain of salt, there are initial signs; one of which is the haunting but uplifting soundtrack from Christopher Young, that director Mark Steven Johnson and screenwriter Evan Daugherty are trying to address more spiritual aspects of their characters as survivors of a war that scarred them both physically and their psyche.

Originally planned as a reunion movie for Nicolas Cage and John Travolta to do their "Face/Off" in the temperate forest with bows and arrows, it was probably more fortunate to have Robert De Niro step in to replace the cagey Cage, so that even an admittedly distracting Travolta with a Serbian accent, could be a snug fit as friends turned rivals with the combined acting chops and muscles of the two veteran actors.

However to confront the warped humanistic sides of religious faith, redemption and finding inner peace for ones deeds in the dark face of war, requires a more abled direction that Johnson may be more suited to, but needs more practice to pull off with eloquence. With awkward pacing when the ball is thrown back and forth between the courts of Ford and Kovac, their unclear motivations beyond wanting each other to admit to their crimes, makes both characters eventually come off as half-baked that it eventually raises the question as to why it took so long to get to its less trodden resolution, which doesn't have quite the same payoff as you would hope to get for it to be profound.

All said and done, "Killing Season" provides respite from a dissonant summer season and is an enjoyable view by anyone who can accept a slow paced story and symbolically spiritual trek, but it won't take you to any new heights.

Cinema Online, 06 August 2013