The Tortured

There is obviously something in the film industry across the world that makes revenge thrillers the flavour of the month at the moment as this is probably the sixth that I've seen this year. The last one was the French film 7 Days in which a grieving father, a surgeon, kidnapped the man who raped and murdered his daughter intending to torture him for six days before killing him on the seventh, at which point he would hand himself over to the police.

Set in Vermont, The Tortured almost seems like a remake of Les sept jours du talion as it begins when a young boy, Benjamin, is taken from his backyard by a man driving a pickup truck and, by the time the police track him down, Benjamin has just been killed after enduring days of torture and abuse at the hands of his psychopathic murderer. Benjamin's parents, Craig and Elise, are understandably distraught when they find out and, when Kozlowski, his killer, comes to trial, they want nothing less than life without parole. However, because there were other bodies found in Kozlowski's yard, he struck a deal whereby he would identify the bodies and the whereabouts of other victims for a sentence of 25 years.

Elise's first reaction is to ask Craig to get her a gun as she can't bear the thought of living with the thought of her son's killer may be getting out of jail in 10 years (or less) and it is up to Craig to temper his wife's ambitions of vengeance. As time goes on, Craig begins hatching a plan to truly get revenge on Kozlowski and Elise goes along with it until they take their car to outside the jail where he is being held and keep a close eye on the entrance where a prisoner transport van is getting ready to move him to another location. Once the van is on the road, Craig and Elise follow it, being careful to keep their distance so as not to arouse suspicion, with a bag full of medical equipment in the boot which Craig has managed to purloin from an ambulance at the hospital where he works.

When the van stops for fuel and one of the two guards gets out to get coffee, Elise follows him and, when he is momentarily distracted by Craig creating a diversion, she squirts a sleeping draught into both cups before running out and getting back in the car and continue their pursuit. It isn't long before the van speeds up and then pulls over, allowing the two guards to get out, at which point Craig jumps into the driver's side, start the engine and drive off with Elise following. Just as the plan is going perfectly, a deer runs across the road in front of Craig causing him to swerve and crash the van over the concrete barrier at the side of the road and ending up upside down on some rocks a few metres away. Although badly injured, disfigured and possibly with head injuries, they grab the man in the orange jumpsuit, put him in the car and drive off.


Setting up home in a countryside house with a basement where Kozlowski is securely fastened to a table by his wrists and ankles with a fluid drip up and another with some painkillers. They intend to make him suffer just as he made their son's final hours agony before killing him and getting on with our lives or go into police custody, whichever happens -- they no longer care.

When the torture begins, it is Elise, who was primarily the one full of fury and ambitions of revenge, who develops cold feet and vomits in a sink outside the basement when Craig takes a soldering iron to his prisoner's chest. Although they both have moments where their hatred for the man turns into extreme violence, there is a great deal of contemplation and wondering just what has happened to them and if they can really go through with such a great deal of torture and, ultimately, murder.

Whilst this is going on, the police are searching for the van and have told Elise that it has gone missing, that Kozlowski has escaped and that they are doing everything to locate him. It may only be a matter of time before they find the van, figure out that Craig and Elise are not at home, put two and two together and realise that the three are in the same location.


One could realistically expect that someone confronted with so many similarly themed films in such a short space of time would become utterly sick of them, seeing each plot development coming a mile off and becoming increasingly bored with every film. Oddly, this isn't the case here and, despite the obvious similarities to 7 Days, I found this to be an utterly involving and interesting meditation on the nature of justice and punishment. The title obviously refers to both parties with Craig and Elise being tortured by memories of their son and what may have happened to him and Kozlowski is literally being tortured by the bereaved parents.


The main performances by Jesse Metcalfe and Erika Christensen are extremely realistic as you can believe that they are a couple, with Elise firstly holding her husband responsible for what happened to Benjamin because he was looking after their son when he was kidnapped as she had just left for work but, as time goes on, she realises that it was no one's fault but Kozlowski's and, rather than play the blame game with her husband, should look to the killer as the person to hold responsible. Playing the child murderer, genre favourite Bill Moseley is extremely creepy before the accident distorts his features and he spends the next hour or so in utter agony.

All in all, this is a worthwhile addition to the 'vengeance' subgenre of the thriller film, much better than something like the laughably bad Law Abiding Citizen and just about as good as 7 Days with an absolutely terrific ending which makes you question most of the events of the last 45 minutes.

The Disc

Extra Features
Sadly, not a great deal of supplementary material with only a 90 second segment of members of the cast and crew responding to the question 'what would you do in that situation?', plus about 10 seconds of behind the scenes footage of what is really EPK material with the expletives bleeped out and a great deal of time and attention on the car crash.

The Picture
As with many American films, this was shot in Canada with Vancouver doubling for Vermont and doing so very well but I'm not particularly familiar with the topography, geography and flora of New England and how it differs from West Coast Canada.

Anyway, The Tortured is very nicely filmed using the locations to good effect as the cabin really is in the middle of nowhere so you can believe that someone can yell until they are blue in the face and no one will hear them. For a 1080p picture, I was a little disappointed in the contrast levels which were grey rather than black and where the odd scene loses a little clarity when the light source isn't perfect. The colours are very good, bright and vibrant when need be and fairly muted when the script calls for it.

When it comes to the SFX make-up, Joel Echallier off the SFX Makeup Inc studio in Vancouver has really done some superb work making the burns, cuts and broken bones look as realistic as possible and enough to make some viewers squirm in their seats.


The Sound
The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track is marginally better than the LPCM 2.0 option, which actually comes up as the default soundtrack, as, although they both do a splendid job of presenting the dialogue clearly and crisply, this has the edge when it comes to the atmospherics and scenes when tension is increased (I won't give an example to avoid spoiling the film).

There is a very fine score by Jeff Rona which perfectly emphasises the emotions of certain scenes, increases the tempo when things get a little out of hand and really underscores the horror during the torture sequences.


Final Thoughts
The Tortured is one of those films that asks 'what would you do?' and 'could you do it?' as they are both very different matters. It is all very well saying that you want to take the person who tortured and murdered your loved one but it's quite another to put your words into actions and 'walk the walk'. By the end, you know that neither Elise nor Craig will ever be the same again and they may not quite be aware of their actions.

As revenge thrillers go, this is extremely watchable (if you don't mind torture sequences!) with a thought provoking subplot and terrific performances by the two leads. Although the extras package leaves a not to be desired, the AV quality is generally very good, some of the contrast levels notwithstanding, and, if you like these sort of films, then this is worth at least a rental.