Between films like THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, THE HILLS
HAVE EYES and WRONG TURN one would think the US was the only country with
backwoods redneck cannibalistic families. Turns out that isn’t the case. With
the film WHAT THEY WATERS LEFT BEHIND we now know you can find them in
Argentina too. Who knew!
In 1985, an Argentinean village called Villa Epecuen was
flooded when the nearby dam bursts. With little time to gather their things the
villagers had to leave as quickly as possible. Now the water has subsided and a
documentary film crew is heading in to look over the devastation. Along with
them is one of those survivors, a woman who was a child at the time.
Along the way they stop at what appears to be the last gas
station before arriving. A creepy old woman selling half rotted meat pies is
the first person they encounter. A dilapidated and filthy bathroom is on hand
for use. A weird mechanic is found to pump gas and a strange looking person is
on hand in a back room. Fueled and read to go they hear off for the village.
An eerie location with dead trees lining the road and
building ruined by the floods the crew finds it the perfect location to shoot
their film. Using the memories of their young victim shot among those ruins
they attempt to shoot what they can before heading out late in the afternoon.
But problems arise as they always do in horror films. It appears as if the gas
line on their van has been cut. Now someone needs to return to the gas station
for fuel.
A car pulls up with a stranger inside who offers to take one
of them to the station. The rest stay behind with the van and to shoot some
more footage. On their way to the station the road is blocked by another car
and someone wearing a bull’s skull. Things are not going as planned.
Eventually crew members are picked off, some captured and
all abused in one form or another. The culprits are a strange family, the ones
we saw at the gas station, who have stayed behind in the village and become a
sort of mutated group like those found in most films of this genre.
Bloodletting, cannibalism and torture soon follow with a surprise twist like
most films of this genre provide.
The question isn’t whether this is a copycat movie but if it
brings anything new to the genre. The answer is yes and no. The typical
characters are here on display that one comes to expect from a film like this.
It adds very little to those depictions we’ve seen over and over again. In that
respect it isn’t so much something new as something done in another country.
What does stand out is the amazing cinematography on
display. The haunting atmosphere of the abandoned village is creep on its own
but unless lovingly captured on film it wouldn’t be as frightening. Cinematographer
Facundo Nuble has brought a skill to his shots that is seen in bigger
productions with a widescreen approach to what he films. It exceeds what most
have come to expect from films in the horror genre.
Having to read the subtitles (not a complaint that’s never a
problem for me) it’s difficult to say if all the performances were good, bad or
indifferent. Those done by the backwoods family are par for the course and add
nothing much to what you would expect. The rest just seem to be fodder for
their antics.
The end result is a movie that’s not bad but not spectacular
either. Fans of the genre will undoubtedly enjoy this movie. Straight laced
horror fans will find the last part of the film little more than torture porn.
On the whole I would recommend it as long as you know what to expect going in.
The nice twist adds to the film and might make the entire thing worth watching.
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