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"Penance" Review


Synopsis: Based on a true character, and from the award winning horror writer/director of 'Days of Darkness', and the producer of the indie horror hit 'Automaton Transfusion', comes a cautionary tale that will make you squirm and twist in your seat. With unrelenting suspense and terror, Penance is the tale of a young, demure single mother, Amelia (Marieh Delfino), who hits upon hard times and decides to take her future into her own hands and becomes a stripper. Everything is going well until Suzy, her stripper friend, is beaten up on a job and recruits Amelia to take her place. Reluctantly, Amelia takes the job, only to find the job isn't everything it seems. Driven to a strange location by a dark and mysterious man (Tony Todd), and confronted by a grizzled hit man (Michael Rooker), Amelia's world is turned upside down, as her captor (the mind bending Graham McTavish), is intent on one thing and one thing only - to purify Amelia and the other women in his incarceration.

Review: In the last few years I have noticed that alot of films have popped up that do the whole first person view style where it shows from the camera the victim is using to document what they are going through and to me after I noticed this was going to be another one of those films it got me wondering if it was going to be another badly done film of that style or if it'd actually deliver the goods. Well I can undoubtedly say this is one of the best films of that style. The film does start out in the typical sense of what I call the "POV" genre but soon into the film things get twisted and the main psychopath of the film gets one of the cameras from the main characters dead friend and uses it, so after that the film goes back and forth between our lead characters view and the villains of the film. One of the biggest highlights of this film for me was the cast that it had, you gets some really good talent in this film. For the most part alot of the cast have minimal lines and not too much camera time but of the ones who are the main focus of the film the 2 actors I enjoyed seeing this film the most were Michael Rooker who always plays a great bad guy or psycho and Graham McTavish who earned some respect from me when he played in Rambo but fully gained respect from me after I got done with this film. The overall acting in this film was great and really helped keep me wanting more. Now lets get to the gore and the kills in this film, for the most part the gore and violence stayed to a more realistic level that never went over the top or seemed silly. Now there are 2 scenes in this film that did start to push me to the uneasy level and for being a fan of gory films it has to be something quite brutal to get me to that point and lets just say that both scenes involve a scalpel and genitals. Overall this was one of the best films of the whole "POV" genre that I have ever seen and honestly it will take alot to top it in my mind. I give this film a solid 5 out of 5!

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