The Afflicted (2010)

 

The Afflicted

 

 

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ 
(Hated It) 

Netflix Synopsis:  A disturbed mother delivers unimaginable abuse to her four children while defending her actions with her own twisted interpretations of the Bible.

My Synopsis:  Supposedly inspired by true events, the film centers on a Bible-thumping drunk that beats her children mercilesslly and without remorse, and then... well, that's about covers it.

  

The Peeps:  Jason Stoddard (writer: director); Leslie Easterbrook, Kane Hodder

Quick Run Down:  Violent, Gratuitous, Entirely Unemotional

Worth the Watch?:  NO!  Run Away!  Run Away!


The Afflicted is narrated by Gracie, the youngest daughter of four in a family parented by Maggie (Leslie Easterbrook) and Hank (Kane Hodder).  The film opens on a birthday party, and, as the party joyfully goes on, Gracie tells us that this was the last happy moment the family ever had.  That night Hank tries to leave Maggie, but, as he attempts to sneak out, she wakes.  Hank is forced to spill the beans, and Maggie responds in a very bi-polar way, swaying from pathetic pleas to vicious threats to promises of devotion (mostly, sexual).  Still, Hank hits the door.  This sends Maggie into a rage, and she assaults him, eventually bashing him over the head with a bat and killing him.  She dumps the body and, later, tells the kids Daddy Hank skipped Dodge.  Now, the real 'horror' begins.  Maggie suddenly turns into a violent, sermon-listening-to, Bible-reading drunk liable to freak out at any second and submit her children to often life threatening but always awful abuse.  This pretty much continues for the rest of the film, until, finally (!), Gracie ends her story about her screwed up mother.

First and foremost - this movie sucks.  I just want to get that out of the way in case, somewhere in this review, you get the impression that I enjoyed the film.  Candidness continued, whether this is based on true events or not, Stoddard wrote a crappy script and did a crappy job behind the camera.  There is no character arc; there is no change in the plot (save, to worsen); and there is no redeeming quality.  Stoddard starts with a small, strange opening that, save the awkwardness and the intrigue of the movie just starting, you are willing to forgive in order to get into the thick of the flick.  This scene is LITERALLY the end of any kind of intrigue the film has.  The rest is just gratuitous.

Once Hank is out of the picture - DEAD "out", that is - Maggie (Easterbrook) turns feral.  She starts beating her children, smothering them with pillows when they are wrong or disobedient, forcing them to eat lard because she thinks she's fat and she wants her girls to be fat also, and shooting them!  Yes - she shoots one of her kids.  How freakin' ridiculous is that?  What is so frustrating about all of this is that the violence is completely groundless.  We haven't seen when Maggie was a GOOD mother, except in the beginning and that scene is WAY too short and we don't see enough of Maggie in it to provide any comparison to what she becomes later in the film.  In addition to that, Maggie is so bi-polar, mercurially bouncing from once stage of psycho to another, that she's immediately established as nuts from the beginning of the film, so the abuse that ensues is expected.  There's no slide into insanity or violence.  There's no "it's the alcohol" or "she's off her meds"; it's just ungrounded, straight violence.  This can be enjoyable (it really can) if there's some reason, but The Afflicted has no reason for its content.  Some may say it doesn't need one, and, for those, this film might actually be decent.  I think for the rest of us, though, this film is pretty pointless, gratuitously violent, and unemotional.

 

A few quick points:  the acting in the film is eh at best, though Easterbrook carries on her role of  a crazy mother type (she plays the mother in Devil's Rejects) pretty well.  Hodder is only in the film for 10 minutes or so, and he acts as well as a stunt coordinator and infamous horror movie mask wearer can.  The cinematography is moot, and the only interesting thing to watch in the movie is a lap dance from a stripper given to a side character that goes on for so long you sort of feel like YOU'RE the one recieving the dance.  I guess that's not too bad of a quality... and it also makes me guess that not a single woman will like this film.  Guys won't really care either way, but they'll secretly dig the lap dance scene.

 

So, if you want some gratuitous, ungrounded violence perpetuated for no reason by a sadistic mother to her way-too-accepting kids, The Afflicted is the flick for you, and you should check it out.  I'd suggest otherwise, but, hey -  either way, it's on Netflix!

 

 

"Just kill me already, mother!"... She really says that.