Severance
Take a bunch of stock British sitcom characters and put them in a horror movie, that’s the basic concept behind Christopher Smith’s new horror comedy.
After an opening sequence that features a man and two beautiful women being chased through some woods by an unknown assailant we’re introduced to our main cast. The sales team of a multi-national weapons manufacturer are on their way to a luxury lodge in
Eastern Europe for a team building exercise. Following a disagreement with their non-English speaking coach driver, they find themselves abandoned by the roadside. Deciding to walk the rest of the way they end up at what Richard, the team leader assumes at first to be the lodge but it is anything but luxurious.
For most of this first half hour, with the exception of the film’s first scene that seems to be there to let you know this is, in fact, a horror movie, the film plays very much like a standard sitcom and an average one at that. But thankfully things take a darker turn as they realise that, not only is this not their planned destination, but there’s someone out in the woods who may be trying to kill them.
This is where the film finds its feet, as it marries graphic violence with side splitting black humour, and this is a very violent film make no mistake about it. Many of the cast meet extremely unpleasant ends, but then that’s one of the film’s charms. How many TV comedies have you seen where you wish the cast would all die horribly? I know I’ve seen a few, and this film gives you the pleasure of seeing such people meet a sticky end.
