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In A Violent Nature centres around a murderer called Johnny (Ry Barrett), who’s been dead and buried for the last 10 years in the woods, following what he got up to 60 years ago, but because someone removes the locket that’s surrounding the pipe goes into the ground, this causes him to be resurrected.
Hang on… why does a dead man require a pipe to breathe through?!
I was aware that this was going to be a very gory offering, albeit one that’s ridiculously slow-paced, and both those boxes are ticked, in part.
Much of the film sees Johnny walking about, really getting his 10,000 steps in – and then some, making this feel more like a walking simulator, similar to what I managed to stomach of Death Stranding, before getting so bored I just had to stop.
Whoever he comes across is in serious danger for their life. However, he can only ever walk incredibly slowly, so if you imagine he’s Gavin Plumb, and everyone else is either Holly Willoughby or other This Morning presenters, a simple brisk walk by them will put plenty of distance between them and him! He’s hardly going to run after them!
However, if he does catch up with someone, then like the Halloween movies, this protagonist has seemingly superhuman strength.
Before I saw In A Violent Nature, I chanced upon a clip I’ll just refer to as the ‘yoga scene’ (below), between Johnny and Aurora (Charlotte Creaghan). This is particularly gruesome – even if the pacing is a bit off as it begins, and because it was so ridiculous, I just burst out laughing! But this then also made me think that every single random murder would be just the same, and they’re not, such as the very first one where he forces a man to run off, who gets caught in a bear trap, but we don’t get to see any of what follows other than the aftermath.
That said, the film does a good reveal of rarely showing Johnny’s face – especially when it’s aided by him chance across a sort-of weapons museum with a cloth helmet – until it gets to the point where it does, so I get the idea of the slow build-up.
However, the major problems with this film are that there are too many murders offscreen, along with there being far too long inbetween them. Plus, when Johnny finds a bunch of men and women in their 20s round a campfire, he watches them for so long, while one of them tells an anecdote, that I’d lost the thread of it, long before they got to the end!
Late on in this film, though…
If we do get more of this, though, then have MORE murders, have them all crazy-gruesome, and stop with the long, tedious segments where nothing happens!
One man in the audience left after about 30 minutes, before we’d even seen the most extreme scenes. However, while one woman stayed, I heard her reacting in the same way my Mum would do if she was watching this, reacting verbally with mutterings like, “Oh no, he’s not about to… is he?”
That said, there’s not a chance she would’ve watched a film like this.
I can’t think why this film was shot in 4:3, either. It’s not like it’s set during a period where that’s how we were forced to watch TV. 1.85:1 would’ve been fine.
There is no mid-credits or post-credits scenes in this film.
In A Violent Nature is in cinemas now, and is available to pre-order on Blu-ray and DVD, ahead of its release date TBA.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 104 minutes
Release date: July 5th 2024
Studio: Shudder, IFC Films
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Cinema: Odeon Trafford Centre
Rating: 2/10
Director: Chris Nash
Producers: Shannon Hanmer, Peter Kuplowsky
Screenplay: Chris Nash
Cast:
Johnny: Ry Barrett
Kris: Andrea Pavlovic
Colt: Cameron Love
The Ranger: Reece Presley
Troy: Liam Leone
Aurora: Charlotte Creaghan
Brodie: Lea Rose Sebastianis
Ehren: Sam Roulston
Evan: Alexander Oliver
Chuck: Timothy Paul McCarthy
Johnny’s Dad: Tom Jacobs (voice)
Radio Newscaster: Casey Macdonald (voice)
The Woman: Lauren Taylor
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.