Another week, another fascist hellscape. What are we trying to say, America? Ha! As if any of us have to guess. Yes, folks, a public dissident execution or “Culling” might be the least problematic of the consequences of Trump returning as President in 2025.
I’m not even sure the film knows the true range of the Van Der Koy empire (A city? A state? A country?). What’s important is that it is ruthless, intolerant, and ran out of victims years ago. As of now, 12 random people are rounded up for “The Culling” every year. Their crimes? Opposition to the ruling despot, Melanie Van Der Koy (Michelle Dockery) mostly. Well … that’s what’s reported. As in the case of Trump, truth isn’t quite as important as a mass-reported show of public cruelty.
Boy (Bill Skarsgård) is deaf and mute. And he has the inner voice of “Bob” (H. Jon Benjamin) from “Bob’s Burgers” (or “Archer” if you prefer). All he knows is what he was taught by Shaman (Yahan Ruhian) who fashioned Boy into a weapon. It’s a fascist police state; none of these people are big on thinking. Boy has significant hand-to-hand combat skillz; he doesn’t do so well with guns; that’s ok. Neither do all the people shooting at him.
In his heart, Boy longs for nothing other than vengeance. In a Culling years ago, the Van Der Koys took his mother and sister. Now all Boy has to remember them is the hallucination of his baby sister,
forever ten-years-old, but still leading him around. Boy has wanted revenge for years yet has always been restrained by Shaman as not being ready (despite all the training). After witnessing the latest show of Culling brutality, Boy decides he’s had enough; he stows away in the trunk of a Van Der Koy vehicle – which already has a dead body it in- and arrives at their garage-level warehouse, “ready” to do battle.
Lacking all speech and sound, Boy has an inner monologue taken from snippets of a two-player kung fu video game he remembers from childhood. He prefaces almost any of his own combat with “Player Two Ready!” Eventually, the monologue leads to the absurd, like the scene when Boy watches a man cry; not having any reference for such, his brain comes up with chimps screeching at one another. And this occurs as a lull in a 75-minute arc of sustained violence … with many surprises to come.
Boy Kills World is a Joe Bob film. Dozens of dead bodies. Kung fu. Macaron fu. Relatives fu. Head rolling. Helmet visor messaging. Twelve pints blood. Lots of sharp and pointy things and even a chase or two. And all presented with a very tongue-in-cheek look at a screwed-up dystopia. This is a film that can be enjoyed by fans of revenge, solo missions, video game style combat, limb severing, or simply the voice of H. Jon Benjamin. Luckily, I claim the last thing, so I’m in.
Losing hearing and fam to a cull
You would think the Boy’s senses would dull
Yet as he grew, he honed
Revenge wouldn’t be phoned
For forever he has “order up” in his skull
Rated R, 111 Minutes
Director: Moritz Mohr
Writer: Tyler Burton Smith, Arend Remmers, Moritz Mohr
Genre: Fascist comedy
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: One-man-wrecking-crew junkies
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: If you’re not into blood, revenge, and fighting, this is probably not your jam
