The Seasoning House (2012)

Sold at a brothel deep in the woods to work as a caretaker, a hapless deaf girl must summon the courage to fight for her life.

Director:

Paul Hyett

Writers:

Paul Hyett, Conal Palmer

Stars:

Rosie Day, Sean Pertwee, Kevin Howarth

3 wins & 1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Rosie Day	...	Angel
Sean Pertwee	...	Goran
Kevin Howarth	...	Viktor
Anna Walton	...	Violeta
Jemma Powell	...	Alexa
David Lemberg	...	Dimitri
Amanda Wass	...	Arijana
Sean Cronin	...	Branimar
Tomi May	...	Aleksander
Emma Britton	...	Samira
Katy Allen	...	Tatjana
Thomas Worthington	...	Vinko
Gina Abolins	...	Jasmina
Dominique Provost-Chalkley	...	Vanya
Fabiano De Souza Ramos	...	Dragan

Storyline

In 1996, in the Balkans, the population of a small town is slaughtered by a militia under the command of the inhuman Goran that abducts young girls for prostitution in a brothel owned by the cruel Viktor. The deaf Angel that witnessed the execution of her mother has a weird birth mark on the face and Viktor chooses her to housework; to put makeup and drug the girls for the clients; and cleaning them up after the brutal encounters. Angel also sneaks between the walls and ventilation ducts during the night. Angel befriends the girl Vanya that knows the language of the deaf. When Goran returns to the house with his men, Angel witnesses one of them raping and killing Vanya and she revenges her new friend killing the man. Now Goran and his men are hunting her down and she is trapped in the house.

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Plot Keywords:

shot in the chest | shot in the head | 2010s | military | army | 

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Taglines:

Exhilarating.

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Genres:

Drama | Horror | Thriller

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

21 June 2013 (UK)

Also Known As:

The Seasoning House

Box Office

Budget:

£850,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Sterling Pictures Ltd., Templeheart Films, Filmgate Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

90 min

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Filmed Entirely in London, England.

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Goofs

Later in the film, when Dimitri attempts to strangle Angel with his belt, she stabs him with a syringe loaded with heroin. He almost immediately reels back, loses coordination, and begins vomiting. The first issue with this is the method of injection. For heroin (or any drug) to have a near-immediate effect when injected, it must be intravenously (IV) injected, i.e., directly into a blood vein. With Angel jabbing the needle randomly into his leg like she does, the chances of hitting a vein directly or hitting and not going through are slim; more likely, the needle will pierce muscle tissue and be injected intramuscularly (IM), a method which will result in a much longer and milder onset of effects.

Also, assuming the dose Angel draws into the needle is comparable to what she normally gives the girls, it likely would not effect a large man the same way it would the smaller girls; specifically, Dimitri probably would not have experienced vomiting and coordination loss to the point where he couldn't stand straight. However, it might also be assumed that the girls have been there a while and have developed a tolerance for the drug, resulting in a larger dose being necessary. If this were the case, the dose might be enough to affect Dimitri in such a manner, assuming he doesn't use heroin on a regular basis himself.

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Quotes

Viktor: [to Angel] One day... one day things will be different. We can go away from this place. This is why I do all of this. So we can be together.

User Reviews

A tragic tale of love, loss and death, this is one film you won't forget in a hurry.

England's answer to Greg Nicotero moves away from the special make up effects and goes behind the camera to bring us this harrowing tale of Angel (Day, in a breath-taking debut), a girl ripped from her home during the war in the Balkans.

In war torn zones, military are kidnapping girls and selling them into the sex trade where they are sold to militia and civilians. Deaf and mute Angel is one of these girls who sees her mother murdered in front of her before being delivered to a brothel where she becomes the personal sex slave to its owner. A birthmark on her face makes her tainted goods so the owner, Viktor (Howarth), uses her to dope the girls with heroin to make them more amenable to their visitors, then clean them up afterwards. She spends her time away from the prying eyes of her captors crawling through the limited space of the ventilation system. Until an unplanned incident brings her head to head with the men who took her from her family.

Make no odds, The Seasoning House is not a comfortable watch but it is impossible to take your eyes from it. Based on true events of atrocities that happened during the war, Hyett brings us into a degenerate world of men willing to pay for sex with tied up, drugged women and pay extra to be rough with them. Some of the girls do not survive some of their "customers". The performances, especially from Day (watch out for her, she will be a name to take notice of) had to be good to make the film believable and to care about Angel. Howarth gives us a dark turn of a man just as at ease plunging a knife into the neck of a young girl to simply make a point as he is pouring a shot of whiskey.

Hyett builds a relationship between Angel and Viktor that enables the power dynamic between the two of them to change during the film. This is integral to some of the major turns in the story and needed to be handled delicately so as not to be too in your face about it but also sustain a sense of believability with the interaction of the two.

The Seasoning House is violent and gripping but never feels exploitative which was needed to ensure you retained a high level of empathy for Angel. It's hard to use the word enjoyed with this film but it is a superb piece of art that fully deserves wider recognition. If you get the chance and can stomach something more hard hitting than your usual Hollywood attempts and horror then I highly recommend this film.

A tragic tale of love, loss and death, this is one film you won't forget in a hurry.