The Loved Ones (2009) review

Dir. Sean Byrne

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★★★

Cut from a similar cloth as Carrie and Hostel, Sean Byrne’s The Loved Ones was among the most acclaimed horror films of the 2010s. It’s not hard to see why. Although adopting the same torture porn tactics that found themselves widely criticized in years prior, Byrne’s approach to the ill-fated prom night formula coupled with a brutally satisfying climax and wicked ending, all while incorporating black humor and coaching up a gaggle of young actors, found itself more artful and appealing than yet another contortionist Saw sequel.

With the recent renaissance the horror genre has seen thanks to the likes of Ari Aster, Robert Eggers, Jordan Peele, and Osgood Perkins, it might be hard to see why this low-key quickie from the late-aughts inspired the way it did. However, from Robin McLeavy’s captivating lead performance to its nimble pacing, it was, and remains, a cut above standard genre fare of then and now. McLeavy plays Lola, an unabashed daddy’s girl who takes it hard when her classmate, Brent (Xavier Samuel), rejects her invite to promote. She does what any girl her age would do and kidnaps Brent. With the help of her father (John Brumpton), the two tie Brent to a chair and torture him into submission.

Brent does a lot of screaming at first, which prompts Lola and her father to saturate his vocal chords with bleach so that will no longer be an issue. She threatens to nail his penis to a chair if he doesn’t urinate by the count of 10. Lola dons a pink prom dress, pampered to a fault by her father, who has gone through the painstaking trouble of inflating balloons and setting up the kitchen like a makeshift high school dance in order to appease his princess. McLeavy eats this role up and spits back a fiery performance. While she has all the room to operate, even overshadowing Brumpton, who is more than double her age, she has a convincing captive partner in Samuel, even as his blood begins to mix with his long, flowing locks to the point of rendering him more animal than human.

You never quite know where Byrne is going to take this threadbare yet effective premise, which is part of the fun of The Lovely Bones. The Australian production is jam-packed with Kasey Chambers and Ollie Olsen, which gift it a pulsating personality. Simon Chapman turns Lola’s decorated home into a horror-house where weapons of torture are as easy to come by as cheap party streamers. Such a violent, gash-happy movie would normally elicit feelings of despondence, but Byrne knows when to dial back on the primality and slightly modify the tone to incorporate humor. His laughs are as authentic as the winces, a sign of a multi-dimensional horror flick made by a confident filmmaker.

Starring: Robin McLeavy, Xavier Samuel, John Brumpton, and Richard Wilson. Directed by: Sean Byrne.