After his brother has been killed, the sheriff decides to hire 2 ex-inmates to catch the sadistic, satanic, twisted, merciless serial killer family. His intent has success and kills the mother twsiting a knife in her rotten pussy, and he is almost able to kill her husband and 2 of her children after a stretch of tortures, but gets killed by the deformed son he wasn't aware of. Luckily the final shoot-out has the cops bullet-pierce the escaping 3 members and so the nightmare is suspended...until the last one will in turn want his revenge.
In this sequel Rob Zombie keeps using '70s movie techniques and effects, not only backgrounds, character's looks, and historical contestualisations of those days, yet what strikes our attention is that the flick begins apparently lame, illuding us it's a common sequel and therefore inferior to the first episode. As the plot develops, not many will have this feeling confirmed, and I bet the descent into further deeper stages of depravation and cruelty has few rivals up to today.
The sheriff is one of the best characters as he feels his revenge is driven by the will of God that is arming his thirst for justice, so don't expect a waterfall of macabre details this time.
The core of the movie is not how much moral lowness isolation, depravation, loss of education and healthy values can cause to a whole matriarchal rural family, it is the realizing that when dealing with some people you can only fight fire with fire; I mean, the sheriff's brother got killed because he trusted the others too much and was shot point-blank as he lowered his guard. So the message is: don't trust anyone, even if they look like angels or harmless.
And the second message is that if you want to eliminate these individuals, you need to find someone at their level who knows every move of theirs; the sheriff's only mistake was not to off them immediately, but the employing of 2 ex-jailed men of that calibre was his best move.
Digressing to war, it seems clear that if the US and the other coailition armies in Iraq or Afghanistan didn't waste time and lives with useless rules of engagement and if they used napalm and bombs systematically instead of face-to-face fights they would've already won the war. If these war rules are applied only by one army, then this one shall never win because some peoples never change and the only way is to eradicate them once and for all.
Now, going back to "The Devil's Rejects", we must emphasize the plot is involving, the pace is fast and the all the cast delivers stunning performances. Zombie doesn't need special effects or several stunts, he points at close-ups more and the expressions you will see are priceless, even better than the dialogues.
Though less gory than "House of 1,000 Corpses", the sophomore release feasts on the family's wickedness and contrasts within itself. The same members don't trust each other and the father-clown's brother betrays when the sheriff comes searching for him and the rest; Captain Spaulding's brother doesn't even want to leave cocaine on the table when he needs taking a piss and there're other occasions for similar quarrels; this makes you understand how 'kind' the 5 demons can be to strangers.
I haven't heard of White Zombie for a while, and shooting a flick takes so much time; that's the reason why I believe we won't see the band reformed. Rob's solo cinema career is going great and he seems to stop at nothing. After proving how bad-ass he can be behind a camera, now he's proven how clever he may get when writing a plot full of surprises and stage-tricks.
Don't miss this masterpiece, for once you start it you'll feel glued to your chairs or couches till the end and you won't have any thought of looking for something to eat or drink. A perverted movie that is gonna grab all your attention.
MARKUS GANZHERRLICH
- 1st March 2010
Filmography:
-House of 1,000 Corpses (2001)
-The Devil's rejects (2004)
