These “Vile” Atrocities are now on Blu-ray!

What was supposed to be a relaxing camping trip amongst friends has turned into a torturous nightmare when four friends wake up to find themselves in the company of five strangers in a basement and learn they’ve all been kidnapped for a purpose.  Behind the illicit arrangement is an illegal drug manufacture whose formula is produced from the byproduct of the brain’s fear and pain induced chemicals.  With a 22-hour clock counting down from the first act of violence, the puzzled lot must fill a 100% quota before time runs out in order to be set free from the reinforced house they awoke in and the only way to do that is by hurting each other to fill the vials connected to the backside of their heads.  Framing a plan, a vote proceeds a numerical order of voluntary participation of torture, each contributing a fraction of the pain percentage needed to survive and be free, but egos, fears, and secrets cost them more than a few moments of unbearable pain.   

Before becoming Paramount Network’s golden nugget for creating the more recent acclaimed American television drama with shows like “Yellowstone,” “1883,” “1923,” “Tulsa King,” and “Special Ops:  Lioness,” Taylor Sheridan had first directed a small-time horror movie over ten years ago in 2011.  The title “Vile,” a play on words used to not only describe the cruel atrocities done from one character to another but also alluding to vial containers used to fill up with fear and pain fluid, is the brainchild of scriptwriters Eric Beck and Rob Kowsaluk.  Certainly, a different tone compared to hardnosed westerners and high-profile casted thrillers, Sheridan filmmaking roots from “Vile” mold his next stage directions of cruel character dynamics.  Beck produces the feature with Noël K. Cohan (“Into the Void”), Tina Pavlides (“100,000 Zombie Heads”), and Kelly Andrea Rubin (“Skeeter”) with presumably father Larry Beck footing some of the funding under the LLC of Vile Entertainment in association with Bosque Ranch Productions and Signature Entertainment.

An ensemble cast thrusts strangers into the throes of do-or-die but amongst the cast of characters, a delicate introduction of a core four put forth the wheels in motion of the sick extraction technique all in the name of drugs and profit.  The preliminary meet-and-greet of Nick (Eric Beck), Tayler (April Matson, “Primrose Lane”), Tony (Akeem Smith, “Holla II”), and Kai (Elisha Skorman) sets up love interests, Tayler’s secret pregnancy, Kai’s drug problem, and a playfully semi-morbid game of would you rather that foreshadows another choice pick of torture later the group has to contend with when joined with the other five test subjects – a dark and cryptic Greg (Rob Kirkland), a subtly anxious Julian (Ian Bohen, “5 Souls”), a selfish hothead Tara (Maya Hazen, “Shrooms”), a young and frightened Lisa (Heidi Mueller) and a level-headed Sam (Greg Cipes, “Deep Dark Canyon”). The variety of character provides varying shades of distrust, betrayal, and hope as factions form and convictions are about-faced, jostling those steadfast at first and solidifying principals for those teetering on the edge.  As whole, the cast works well together to provide adequate and satisfying suspicion as well as selling a particular attitude despite a couple of red herrings that are hidden really well within the framework. As individuals, lots of the dialogue pertains to self-explanatory states of the obvious that stick out like a sore thumb of colloquial filler with a story set in one location with the same nine people for approx. an hour long. ”Vile’s” cast rounds out with McKenzie Westmore and the unmistakable Maria Olsen (“I Spit on Your Grave 2: Deja Vu”) in a procedure-nothing televised head. 

As much as I disfavor comparing one film to another outside of sequels, series, or franchises, “Vile’s” voice is lost as an individual. Seven years prior, James Wan and Leigh Whannell began what would become one of the biggest contemporary horror franchises with “Saw,” spanning sequels through two decades, and concluding, thus so far, with this past year’s “Saw X.” What does this have to do with “Vile?” ”Vile” follows much of the same formula Wan and Whannel concocted in the earlier 2000s with a very to-the-manual approach of “Saw’s” collaring of individuals, media announcing a timed-task, and the players of the game have to hurt themselves, or others, in order to be set free. Fundamentally different with “Vile” has more to do pure greed and profit at the expense of those unfortunate to be in the path of profiteers whereas “Saw” forces transgressors into rebirth through pain and suffering. ”Vile” is also not as explicitly graphic with much of the torturous violence done out of sight, off screen, or in a blink of an eye. Nevertheless, the intriguingly staid premise takes the human condition to the limit and steps across the line of no return of committing what is self-destructively necessary to survive. Beck and Kowsaluk tweak the formula by a narrow margin but the manner of how the narrative plays out distances “Vile” to almost unitary means. For example, “Saw” almost always had a dual storyline that eventually converges with a shocking twist-tie conclusion. ”Vile’s” straightforward with a singular storyline that isn’t dichotomized with a parallel storyline, a periodization storyline, or any other type of storyline to be a crutch for the other, leaving audiences in the undivided present that’s an around-the-clock time crunch to live or die by the hands of themselves or at the mercy of others, and with a palpable enough twist that you’ll kick yourself in the chin for not predicting it ahead of time. 

“Vile” comes to Blu-ray from MVD Visual on the company’s Marquee Collection label. The AVC encoded, 1080p High-Definition, BD25 has the film presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio. Limited to a two-tone grading of steely blues and canary yellows, picture quality range has spasmodic bursts of interiority to agreeable presentations. More of the pre-ensnarement night scenes appear granulated by macroblocking, degrading the image to pre-high definition pixelated rate. Bitrate decoding jumps sporadically from mid-teens to mid-30Mbps, most likely due to an unstable data compression transfer. Compression appears better, though not flawless, later in the runtime with tighter contouring and a finer detail on a grungy, dirty, dilapidated house where the main set takes footing. The English Dolby Digital 5.1 and the uncompressed LCPM 2.0 are the available audio options, both of which lack commodious conviction with a suppressed volume. While the dialogue renders sufficiently with discernibility and clarity, much of the eye-averting torture sound design, the milieu audio, and even the rock-hard rock soundtrack retains an undeliberate lo-fi quality. English subtitles are optionally available. Special features include two deleted scenes that expand on more of the earlier character interactions, a behind-the-scene moment of director Taylor Sheridan mopping the kitchen set and singing, and the feature trailer plus other MVD Marquee Collection trailers. Tangible features include a cardboard O-slipcover, first pressings only, vaunting the nastiness to come and, again, appropriates a “Saw” cover with that nastiness of an extracted, bloody tooth in a pair of vice grip, a nod to the “Saw III” poster/home video art. The Amary case has reversible cover art with the original “Vile” artwork on the inside. The unrated, 88-minute MVD Marquee Collection feature has a region free playback. If “Saw” is deluxe imperial crab, then “Vile” is the suitable imitation equivalent with a steady pace of group-wrenching contrition and contempt that forgoes the games for straight up blunt force trauma. 

These “Vile” Atrocities are now on Blu-ray!