Movie Title: Closure (aka Straightheads)
Genre: Crime, Drama, Horror, Thriller,
Starring: Gillian Anderson, Danny Dyer, Adam Rayner, Antony Byrne, Anthony Calf, Ralph Brown, Steven Robertson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Neil Finnighan, Francesca Fowler
Review: Driving back from a posh party at a country estate, Alice (Gillian Anderson) and Adam (Danny Dyer) find themselves brutally assaulted by a group of men. Physically and emotionally devastated by the attack, the tables suddenly turn when Alice and Adam discover the identity of their attackers. This time, it's their turn to exact the ultimate revenge.
Closure is part of the exploitation sub-genre - rape turned revenge fantasy. It has plenty of violence, tension, and disturbing, horrifying situations, but that's kind of all that it has going for it. Our lead characters aren't really established for us to know them enough to care for them. And after the "assault" they have interesting developments to their relationship to say the least. But since the audience is not clear of how these characters were before the trauma we're not sure how they've changed other than what we've seen in other movies like this that came before.
Gillian Anderson and Danny Dyer are quite good in the roles and dealing with the subject matter. I just wish the script and direction was a bit better. The movie does try to build up to the inevitable revenge sequence in the third act, but it doesn't seem to have any momentum to get you there. I think Closure would have been a much more interesting movie if it truly dealt with the aftermath of those that have fallen victim to physical and sexual assault instead of a revenge thriller. It probably needed that aspect to get the movie made, which is a shame. A lot of potential for a hard to watch, yet interesting movie that needed more dynamic characters and a story that suited them.
Fun Fact: Gillian Anderson was attracted to the material because she found it alarmingly dark. Following The X-Files (1993), she was bombarded with supernatural and costume dramas, so the allure of a contemporary thriller with something to say about retribution proved very tempting.