LEFT BANK (aka Linkeroever)
Sub-Genre- Supernatural
Cast Members of Note- The adorable Eline Kuppens, Matthias Schoenaerts and a bunch of other Belgian actors. Or is it Flemish?
What's it About?- Marie is a hot Belgian track star who is training for the biggest meet of her life when she meets a mysterious and wet guy named Bob, in her local locker room. He pulls the old "hey, I'm wet and naked, got a towel?" routine, and she totally falls for it because she seems to be horny and a bit easy to get in bed.
After the two of them have sex in every way possible, she decides to move in with him, where they proceed to have even more sex in every way possible again. I guess she just doesn't like her first dates to end? This certainly isn't going to help her win any track meets.
Soon enough though, things go from blissful and orgasmic to painful and creepy, as not only does she begin to grow suspicious of her new living arrangement with her dream guy, but she starts to secrete powder from her lady parts and sprouts a festering knee wound that looks like she's turning into a zombie or something. STD's are no joke. Maybe this is a good lessons about the dangers of casual sex.
Is Bob some creepy killer? Are Bob's neighbor's creepy killers? Who the hell names their kid Dirk? I don't want to spoil too much more for you here, but suffice it to say that Marie finds herself in some deep doo doo which she may not be able to escape from, and the ending absolutely threw me for a loop.
The Good- It's not hard to imagine some creepy shit like this going down in Europe. I mean when you think of the term "Old World", you have to think of Europe, and if something ancient and evil exists in the world, it just makes sense that it exist there, doesn't it? This movie plays along the lines of Rosemary's Baby or The Wicker Man, with a quiet, gloomy old world "village folk" kind of feel to it, which I kinda dig.
This was a pretty cool movie, and aside from the ending, I was in to it the whole time. It's bloody, gross, creepy, pretty interesting, the actors did a good job, and it looks great thanks to its Belgian locales... but what's with the babies? The theme of rebirth is obviously prevalent here, but I'm not sure as to what the whole point was as far as some of the actions that theme caused. I'll need to watch it again to straighten it all up in my mind, and it won't be so bad because I liked it.
The Bad- Ok, so was this a movie about midwives? I really thought it was heading one way, and then at the end it totally flipped itself on its ass and did something that left me dumbfounded. I don't want to spoil what happens for anyone, I'm just saying that I don't completely get it.
The Downright Horrendous- For the love of all that is holy, what in the hell was that stuff coming out of Eline Kuppen's cooter? Gunpowder? Don't even get me started on the hairy knee wound either. And for that matter, what's in the f'ing bowl ?!? WTF?!?
The Gory- There were all sorts of nasty, gross and cringe inducing things in this movie, and yet the violence wasn't over the top for the most part. Blood, puke, discharge, festering wounds, and arrow violence... neat, huh?
The Naked- Thank you Belgium for delivering the T&A, and graphic sex scenes that horror so desperately needs more of. I'm talking full frontal nudity here, with the hot Eline Kuppens even shows her Flemish Cap! (see what I did there?) She looks pretty good all greased up and naked, that's all I'm saying.
What did we learn?- Never but in to other people's domestic violence disputes. Also, dating just isn't worth the crap you have to go through.
The Master Says- B+ (8.0/10) Left Bank was a really good movie, both in look and tone, and it certainly had its gross out moments and tension filled bits, but I have to admit that the ending left me wondering what in the hell it was all about. It's a great experience, I was just surprised to find myself scratching my head at the end, as what I expected to go down never really did. Kinda. Give it a look see, and feel free to tell me what it was that I missed at the end.Final Thoughts- Cute little Eline is not scared to be naked at all, and for that I give her all kinds of mad props.
