Dutch B-movie provocateur Roel Reiné, probably best known for the horribly botched MCU flop Inhumans, returns to a subject he tackled fifteen years ago: a murderous, highly intelligent bear. Savage Hunt is an oddly staid affair considering the director’s penchant for outré violence and outright absurdity, but it does have a real bear… some of the time. Though Reiné’s production company, Rebel Films, has advertised that as its primary calling card, the truth is most of the bear’s presence (and its bloody exploits) is seen via abysmal after effects.
Savage Hunt is more a maudlin family affair than it is a genuine creature feature, with Reiné and writers Chad Law and Christopher Jolley focusing most of the drama on two families in crisis. On one hand is Jace (Anthony Barclay), a foreman at a construction site for a new resort in rural Montana (actually Bulgaria, and it’s particularly obvious). Jace is in the midst of divorce proceedings with Lacey (Noush Skaugen) and his daughter, Alex (Priya Blackburn), hates him for reasons that are never quite made clear. Lacey is overly generous towards her ex-husband, while Alex’s character is so adamantly wishy-washy in attitude it’s difficult to tell just how she feels towards her father.
On the other hand is Ranger Kate Deeks (Fotina Papatheodorou), whose perpetually blank expression and emotionless delivery is supposed to indicate someone dealing with intense personal loss. She and Sheriff Jeff Riggins (Colin Mace) are brought into Jace’s orbit when, one day, two environmental activists are found brutally maimed by a bear. Kate and Riggins want to shut down the construction site while they neutralize the threat; Jace is desperate to keep his workers paid.
Savage Hunt Is Neither Savage Nor a Particularly Interesting Hunt.
Meanwhile, the entire town is, apparently, pissed at the company for building the resort in the first place for its encroachment on the natural landscape. Jace is confronted by a disgruntled local at a diner one evening who argues that the construction company is forcing wild animals into urban areas in their destruction of their natural habitat. But then, a lot of the locals are being employed by the same project. That tension between economic need and environmental disaster is the film’s only real interesting thread, but it is never pulled at in any believable manner.
The political implications of this Jaws riff are confusing. Considering the state’s voting records, it’s difficult to imagine a rural Montana town that would be this upset about environmental degradation and this unbothered by incursions into labor laws, but then this is an American-style film made by an entirely European cast and crew. It’s never easy to escape the knowledge that the cast comprises British, Greek, Bulgarian, Swedish and Irish actors being directed by a Dutch filmmaker in a Bulgarian forest meant to signify Montana. No one is acting (or, crucially) sounding American, nor does any of the frames look American. Which begs the question — why set it there? In one especially strange moment, an Irish field journalist reports live from a disaster scene. Are the Irish particularly clocked in to local American human interest stories?
That lack of authenticity across the board makes the film a sluggish and difficult watch. Everything just feels a bit like boring cosplay. The one American actor in the main cast is James Oliver Wheatley, whose Joe Regan goes from being essentially an extra to the film’s only character. A former ranger and Kate’s husband, Regan is touted as an expert bear tracker and roped in to find her. Wheatley brings a certain degree of gravitas to the film’s dire proceedings, and the final act, which is a nearly wordless, Predator-like hunt, is the film’s only source of moderate entertainment. But by that point, it’s too late.
Between its molasses pace, uneven acting and absurd musical choices, most of Savage Hunt is an unmitigated disaster. Reiné, who directs, co-writes, photographs and composes the film, is wearing too many hats, and none of them look very good. Several sequences rely on cross-cutting or montage and come across as music video fare. The cinematography is either blown out or too dark and poorly contrasted. At only 88 minutes, Savage Hunt feels double its length. Perhaps it would’ve been best if Jace – and Reiné – had shut down operations earlier.