Code of Hunting

Code of Hunting

source: Code of Hunting

Jorge Grau's film, Code of Hunting aka: Hunting Ground was almost 10 years after is more well known, The Legend of Blood Castle (1973), Violent Blood Bath and Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, both 1974. It is well made but rather slow for the first half, and not to much happening with a hunting on the lake and looking inside supermarkets and stores. It does get going with a home invasion and an accident and then at the end a really terrible nasty sleaze another home attack with very brutal and sexual violence. Eventually there it comes the revenge and by this time we are almost shouting for the lawyer, Adela played by the famous actress, Assumpta Serna who certainly earned her money on this one.

A very interesting incursion by Jorge Grau in the Quinqui trend (a Spanish young delinquents subgenre), that switches the traditional point of view of these films from the aggressors to the victims. That makes the movie a little more conventional (it's much easier to empathize with the victims) and with the social message more prominent, but the powerful direction of Grau, the dark mood and the excellent acting all around makes up for it. It's a slow burner but with a big finale.

Fairly obscure and downbeat "home invasion" exploitation film from Spain. A pacifist lawyer who regularly defends down and out criminals has her Mini stolen. After finding some of her documents in the car the bad guys plan to rob the "rich b-word". The home invasion ends with Adela's husband being shot in the head by accident after he struggles to defend himself. A bit of stalking later and things come to a head with an unnecessarily graphic rape and some violent scenes. The violence is graphic with massive blood splatters and bloody bullet wounds showing flesh. Clearly taking influence from splatter slasher movies of the 1970s and 1980s. This is a relatively short film at around 100 minutes with a lot of boring dialogue bits. It lacks the punch of taught violent thrillers like "Rabid Dogs" and "Bloody Friday". It's an OK film and despite being made in the early 80s it has lost none of its ability to shock. The version I saw was the recent Blu-Ray from Mondo Macabro which has a superb 4K print with no archive damage from what I can tell and is about as good as it gets for a film most people will have seen on bootleg VHS. The subtitles were accurate conveying the nastiness of the thug's abuse. Unfortunately audio is only 2.0, but the levels are loud and balanced.

Exploitation - that it is, but director Jorge Grau tells it in a dramatically sensible manner, slowly building up to what is unavoidable in these films - a brute finale. Still, with plenty to think (and shudder) about afterward. The portrayal of both sides of the same coin that is society - a woman and her family and a poor family and a few befriended criminals - begins with the main characters together in the same room, a courtroom. The woman is a lawyer defending a criminal with compassion, and two misfit type guys are in the crowd making jokes amongst themselves. After her elaborate plea, the camera zooms out slowly while the judges, lawyers and audience leave the room - finally it is pretty much empty... The lawyer then drives home, followed by the duo, who waited outside for her. They steal her car when she stops to buy groceries and find out she has a chalet on a large hunting ground. They intend to rob the place, but things go horribly wrong, and that is only the beginning... There are all kinds of sidelines going on (the innocent brother of the main criminal being innocent but is incarcerated, the son of the lawyer couple who reads comics about a masked hero and is fascinated by dad's shotgun, the lawyer who at first intends to forgive the assailant) that make this much richer and deeper than your average revenge / home invasion flick, making this a unique feat - though still you'll have to be able to stomach some pretty nasty violent actions. A big 8 out of 10, maybe more in the future.

COTO DE CAZA (1983) This is one of the best films I ever saw and I can't help but express my total indignation to the fact that filmmaker Jorge Grau doesn't have the attention he deserves. Only a master to conceive such a impactful work of art. This is a movie that couldn't be produced today with all the correctness imposed to art in general, and I will not take a position in relation to the discussion raised by the story. I believe that cinema must be evaluated not by any moral criteria, but by the excellence of its artistic conception. And what we have here is a perfect production. Everything works wonderfully well. The script is carefully structured and the character development respects coherence and cohesion, leading us to immerse ourselves in the plot without any hesitation. All this is helped by a fluid editing and an impecable job by all the cast. I was speechless with the perfornance of Assumpta Serna. Previously, I had seen her in a small role in the bomb "Wild Orchid" (Zalman King, 1989) what made me have a negative impression about her, but I was totally wrong. The disturbing violent scenes will put many viewers off, but they are vital to the efficience of its message. This is not an excercise in exploitation, but a serious drama that hurts our sensibilities precisely because it exposes how fragile our system of values can be. Only open and mature minds are prepared to this, but this is a movie that needs to be rediscovered and appreciated in its uncut format. After watching the excellent "No Profanar El Sueño De Los Muertos" (1974), I developed an interest in the work of Jorge Grau. Now, after "Coto De Caza", I have no doubt that he is among my favorite authors.

This slow-paced crime thriller was seen by some critics as a plea by Jordi Grau in favour of the death penalty. He categorically denies that. Generally this film is uncomfortable to watch. In many ways the outcome is predictable, as is the ordeal Ms Serna's character is going through, but the predictability and the slow pace somehow make it worse. It is like falling out of an airplane at ten thousand feet without a parachute. You know what is going to happen and the anticipation of the inevitable gruesome outcome makes you wish that it is over sooner rather than later. Interestingly, the film has much stronger female than male characters, an unusual attribute for movies (not counting TV movies) of this genre. The film centers around the lawyer played by Assumpta Serna, and she amicable pulls off the performance required to hold everything together.

Methodical Spanish thriller from Grau, (Let Sleeping Corpses Lie) takes the time to develop character and motivation of both villains and protagonist before an extremely graphic finale. A very young Assumpta Serna is a criminal defense attorney who is confronted not only by the mother of her husband's killers, but by the vengeful mother of her murdered husband as well. Midway through the proceedings, she asserts that she doesn't want to live in a world where the only rule is the code of the hunt. The setup could have easily been one for typical revenge fare, but this does not take the simple path of having her immediately hardened by misfortune and bent on vengeance. Instead, she tries to return to normalcy at every turn, until finally forced to do otherwise. Grau has some interesting shots during the initial home invasion, as well as the final confrontation and breaks up the interim routine by showing the impossibility of regular life. This is a better film of the genre, in that it takes a more even tone and pace than is typical and does not provide simplistic fan-baiting violence every 15 min. Grau fulfills viewer expectations, but not in the most expected manner.