More specifically, "Big Bad Wolves" plays like an extended tribute to the torture scene in "Reservoir Dogs," a description that alone should tell readers whether they'll find it appealing or not. The victim, a mild-mannered young schoolteacher who is suspected of killing and beheading a number of little girls, is strapped in a chair, where his toenails are ripped from his feet, his chest scorched with a blowtorch and his neck carved into with a rusty blade. (If this sounds like a fun night at the movies, then by all means, pile the kids into the wagon and go.)
As in Tarantino, all the gruesomeness isn't served straight but rather garnished with a portion of absurdist japery. For example, when the torturers apply the blowtorch to naked flesh, one remarks approvingly that it "smells like barbecue." A few of these jokes score a laugh; most come off as formulaic and flat.
For that young teacher, Dror (Rotem Keinan), the abuse is close to unrelenting. Early on, he's picked up and beaten mercilessly by three cops. When a video surreptitiously made of that assault goes viral, it seems like he may get a reprieve. But no. After another headless child is found, rogue cop Micki (Lior Ashkenazi) goes after Dror again, but his assault is interrupted by the little girl's father, Gidi (Tzahi Grad), who imprisons both the detective and the teacher in the basement of his remote country home since his motives are different than those of the police: Rather than wanting to solve the crimes, he simply intends to torture the young man into revealing the location of his daughter's head, then kill him.
Although the hour or so of torture that follows features some adroit plot twists, "Big Bad Wolves" is one of those movies in which certain storytelling lapses are bound to frustrate more logical-minded viewers. Unless I missed something, we're never told why the police came to suspect Dror in the first place, and his tormentors don't mention any evidence in their unavailing efforts to force a confession from him. If, as we're told, the murderer sexually violated every orifice of his victims, wouldn't DNA evidence provide irrefutable proof of Dror's guilt or innocence? Have the Israeli police never heard of forensics?
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