Victim - DVD

Film: Kyle Limato (Michael Biehn) retired from society several years ago and now lives in a cabin in the California woods. His peace is disturbed one night by young Annie (Jennifer Blanc). The desperate woman asks him for help, as she is being hunted by two men who have already killed her friend Mary (Danielle Harris). The explosive part is that the men are influential cop James Harrison (Ryan Honey) and his buddy Jonathan Cooger (Denny Kirkwood). Therefore, no help can be expected from the cops. At first, Kyle is reluctant to get involved. But soon he succumbs to the charm of the attractive Annie - with bloody consequences...

Michael Biehn directed Victim on a mini-budget of $800,000 in just eleven days near Malibu. He was supported primarily by family and friends, first and foremost his wife Jennifer Blanc, whom he has put as a thank you (and certainly out of a certain pride) especially in the joint sex scene very handsome in the picture. What the actor known from films like Terminator or Aliens in the short time with relatively little money as a director, screenwriter and leading actor has put up, has its moments. Using elements of grindouse filmmaking and exploitation horror, Biehn has directed a thriller that is suspenseful and also kind of fun in its best moments.

The problem is that some of the dialogue is really subterranean, and the many flashbacks in which you are shown how Annie and Mary prepared for the meeting with James and Jonathan and what happened during the rendezvous keep thwarting the actual story. For its already fairly short running time, there's just too much unnecessary talking instead of any real suspense, which is likely to bother viewers who were expecting a solid horror thriller here. In addition, some big logic holes open up again and again, which Biehn has a hard time closing. For example, one wonders why Kyle, who has supposedly withdrawn completely from society, is shown in the first scene during a very relaxed-looking visit to a café. This can be explained to some extent by the end (why, of course, shall not be revealed here), but this debut for this character is certainly not well chosen.

Despite its very obvious weaknesses, Victim is well worth watching as a low budget thriller. The decent acting of Biehn and co-star Ryan Honey, a few well-done moments of suspense, and an underlying irony that comes through, especially in the final seconds, make this B-movie worth watching in the end - as long as you, the viewer, don't expect more from the film than what it has to offer.

Picture + Sound: A very artificial blue tint is noticeable during the dark scenes, which adds to the overall somewhat cheap look of the film. Otherwise, however, good image sharpness and a color scheme that is consistent in the bright scenes leave a clean, trouble-free overall impression. The sound mix is rather unspectacular. The directionally mixed dialogue dominates the action, while ambient sounds and other sound effects are somewhat lost. Since in a dialogue-heavy thriller but no surround fireworks can be expected anyway, this is still enough overall for a satisfied: Good!

Extras: In addition to the trailer and other program tips of the provider has the DVD still a quite worth seeing Making of (approx. 24 min.), but unfortunately no optional subtitles are available.

Conclusion: Victim is a mix of grindhouse thriller and exploitation horror that has some good approach, but also a few obvious weaknesses such as noticeable logic holes. It's perfectly fine for a small low budget production, but it's not quite enough for a truly gripping thriller. Still: some very intense moments, the decent actors and the good, though not quite surprising ending, make the film worth watching for genre fans after all!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp