The Killing ofa Sacred Deer

From Yorgos Lanthimos, the brilliant director and conceptualizer behind The Lobster, arrives an unsettling psychological horror venture - The Killing of a Sacred Deer!

At first, the film would baffle the hell out of you. Anger you, even annoy you to an extent. Nothing would make sense. Why are the characters cold and phlegmatic? Who's this boy the protagonist's meeting out of nowhere? Almost every scene early on would prompt you to give up. But, once the runtime elongates for a while up till a certain point in time, it'll show and teach you to wear the right metaphorical lens for the viewing of this motion picture. From then on, everything becomes clear as crystal!

The kid named Martin (Barry Keoghan) essentially represents ghost of a past severe mistake, karma, nature or even God. Our hero Steven (Colin Farrell) has blundered. A blunder that costed a life. Deep down inside, he is disturbed by this. That's exactly why from the very beginning, without notice, he has been coming across Martin out of inherent guilt. This is also vividly hinted from the way Steven has been secretive and hideous about Martin to the rest of his surrounding, as how one would do any of their shameful mistakes. Or just look at the main character, having full beard, visually trying to conceal something from us.

Steven tries to console Martin by presenting him a watch, hoping by doing so would clear the balance sheet and settle him off the blunder. Nonetheless, that method doesn't work, as Martin keeps reappearing even more frequently than before, both consciously and subconsciously, softly reminding the main character that the bribe or consolation earlier isn't at all equivalent to compensating for the mistake he has committed.

Next step, Steven attempts to use sympathy through his family and convince Martin, by inviting him over for a visit. This is seduction, a challenge for the antagonist to give up his plans on whatever he's intended to do on Steven. Martin makes a tough choice to avoid Steven's daughter Kim (Raffey Cassidy), who essentially represents distraction. Not only she distracts Martin, she does the same to her parents as well most of the time. Having another go as a soft reminder, Martin utilizes his way of seduction through his mother on Steven, hoping to pull the protagonist towards his side and comply. The futile effort leaves Martin with no options other than to confront Steven head-on and directly inform the most explicit idea of what would be the fair, blood for blood and tooth for tooth repayment for the latter's wrongdoing. A life for a life. From here on begins a non-stop nerve-wracking ride of a terrifying thriller!

No matter how Steven avoids it, grapples against it, runs away from it, ignores it, scolds and beats the hell out of it like how most of us culprits would blame nature or God for our own faults or malfeasances, the ghost haunts and chases after him relentlessly! Martin even tries the easy way by showing an important supporting character Anna (Nicole Kidman) what would the result be like if they choose to address the blunder, by enabling Kim to walk a bit when she clearly couldn't seconds ago. Anna is the first to swallow the bitter pill and kiss the feet of Martin, bowing to the ultimate power at governance. But, Steven takes no hints and goes the opposite way to repel the decision that's obviously hard to proceed with.

It's either one life or all of it to make Steven realize how serious misconducts are and one can never escape from it without paying on equal terms. This is exactly how nature or karma works, doing so to personally make one feel the pain his or her mistake has caused to others who are directly impacted by it. We are permitted to breathe after Steven finally accepts the truth and Russian-roulettes himself in an extremely intense climax! As he parts way with Martin, we know the familiar guilt would no longer disturb him as peace has been made with it, once and for all.

Now it makes sense why the personas are emotionless or showcasing minimal reactions as best as they could! Having blood for blood, tooth for tooth and life for life as the theme, it may sound merciless, brutal and unacceptable. But that's the way it is! That's precisely how truth functions - one-dimensional with no room for emotion but logic, logic and logic alone! By stripping off and muting feelings plus expressions, the director allowed the theme to pop! The value for emotions here is too precious! When it's used for the one time to show our hero weeping at dead end, it absolutely nailed the point that there's no route elsewhere other than to submit himself to the truth, crowning the thesis theme as winner.

Barry Keoghan's performance is really good! Music department led by Johnnie Burn petrified us with high streaks of violins! However, as genius as the metaphor is, certain scenes are definitely out of place or unnecessary, such as Anna masturbating Steven's colleague or the multiple armpit hair displays. Even the picture opening up with a thumping heart in the midst of a surgery could make many stomachs turn. Speaking of the movie's opening, Yorgos' style of filmmaking here is very Stanley Kubrick-esque! The way pre-requisite background score before revealing any visual storytelling is reminiscent of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Bird-eye distance shots tracking the characters' motions alike God or someone watching their every movement is relevant to the story and theme, but what it also did was jogged our memories of The Shining's eeriness.