Review of the movie «Azrael»

On November 7, a horror film with action elements «Azrael», starring 32-year-old Australian actress Samara Weaving. A distinctive feature of the local narrative is the absolute absence of dialogues, and in the review below we will understand why it is better not only not to hear this movie, but also not to see it.

«Azrael»

Genre horror, action movie, survival thriller
Director E. L. Katz
Starring Samara Weaving, Vic Carmen Sonne, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, Katharina Unt, Peter Christofferson, Eero Milonoff
Premiere movie theaters
Year of issue 2024
Website IMDb

Among the indifferent majestic trees in the dense forest are a frightened blonde girl with beautiful blue eyes, Azrael, and her companion, Kenan, who has decided to make a fire. But this is not allowed because the couple is on the run and hiding from members of a mysterious religious cult in which communication is a sin. So all the cultists, who have had their vocal cords surgically removed, communicate mostly by whistling.

However, even this does not prevent them from quickly capturing the fugitives to make them victims for the sinister, burnt cannibal creatures that are excellent at catching the smell of blood. The seemingly doomed girl was destined for the role of dinner, but she managed to break free and escape. Now she has to do everything possible to survive, and at the same time, with any luck, save Kenan. As the opening credits warned, the events take place many years after the fateful Rapture.Initially, the «Azrael» set resembles a discolored post-apocalyptic in the spirit of «The Walking Dead» — here you have gloomy autumn forests where monsters hungry for human flesh roam, civilization rolling back centuries, man being wolf to man, and all that. But at the same time, the creators of the film, director E. L. Katz and screenwriter Simon Barrett, decided to mess with the viewer’s head for some reason. They decided to dilute this unpretentious bloody bacchanalia framed in folk-mountain with religious allusions, which are like deaf music here.

Moreover, a movie has already been made about Samara Weaving doing exactly the same thing on screen as she does here — a much more fun and incendiary «Ready or Not». And there have been so many action movies about unyielding loner characters, including those forced to run through inhospitable forests, that you’ll get tired of remembering — «Rambo», «Hard Target», the more recent «The Hunt» with Betty Gilpin, etc.«Azrael» doesn’t work well as a horror because it’s in the realm of standard genre techniques, and it’s not outstanding in the context of an action movie because you can’t find exciting fight scenes here by day with a candle. The filmmakers don’t try too hard to be suspenseful, and the stories about bloodthirsty creatures appear with enviable regularity. The whole thing looks more like senseless violence for the sake of violence with a pretense, nothing more.

The film is completely devoid of dialogues, and in this form, within the framework of the declared genres, the bet should be on tension, as it was in «A Quiet Place» Joseph Krasinski, or a dynamic uncompromising confrontation. Otherwise, how else to fill the time limit.

The Australian actress is probably one of the few bright spots in every sense against the backdrop of continuous gloom and meaningless confusion. The evil woman with the appearance of Charlize Theron’s character in the movie «Monster» and the pregnant cult leader are also memorable, but only because of their snow-white clothes, which are also here for a reason. Other extras either instantly fall victim to the unyielding Azrael or are brutally eaten by the local Freddy Kruegers, except that their degree of roasting has clearly gone further than well done.