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‘Fresh Kills’ Review: Jennifer Esposito’s Mafia Drama Puts the Women in the Spotlight

Christian zilko.

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Of course, the stories never end as happily as they begin. The sacred bonds of family rarely survive the stresses posed by greed, law enforcement, and the massive egos this line of work attracts. Sometimes, all it takes is a guy named Big Sam making a disrespectful comment about his cousin’s new boat to start a massacre that brings a family to its knees. Related Stories Netflix’s ‘Heeramandi’ and the Death of the Bollywood Heroine Netflix Loves Documentaries, as Long as Filmmakers Seek to Entertain

The takeaway is often that if you invite evil into your life, it eventually becomes impossible to leave it at work. When a gangster survives long enough to see his idyllic home life ruined by his own bad decisions, there’s always a regretful moment where he looks back at what could have been. But who’s to say that what could have been wasn’t also terrible?

That’s the question that Jennifer Esposito seeks to explore in her directorial debut “Fresh Kills.” The ’80s-set period piece follows the wife and two daughters of a Staten Island mob boss as they navigate the material comforts and unspoken expectations that come with living in the male-dominated world of organized crime. Esposito skillfully steers the story away from tired stereotypes we’ve seen before, like the “mob wife” seething at home while her husband cheats or the daughters who live in fear of a violent father. Instead, the film takes a nuanced look at the existential anxiety that can haunt the women in this world when things are going (relatively) well.

That’s the lesson she tries to teach her daughters Rose (Emily Bader) and Connie (Odessa A’zion) as they grow up in the shadow of the mafia. “Fresh Kills” spans most of their childhoods, beginning in the summer of 1987 and continuing through 1998. The large canvas allows us to watch as the two girls form their own wildly divergent opinions about the family business.

Connie is endlessly loyal to her father and wildly appreciative of the lifestyle he provides her. She’s always quick to spring to his defense and even quicker to marry a young gangster and embrace life as a mob wife. Rose approaches things differently. She can see that there’s life beyond Staten Island, and she allows herself to entertain dreams of going to cosmetology school and hosting a TV show about beauty. When her father showers her with gifts — like buying a bakery for her to run without ever asking if she was interested — they feel like golden chains tying her to a life that she isn’t sure she wants.

“Fresh Kills” is at its best when it explores the complicated nuances of mob life through small, everyday moments between Francine and her daughters. But the major plot points that comprise the skeleton of the story often veer into melodrama that isn’t executed quite as sharply. At certain points the film seems unsure of what it wants to be, injecting its straightforward ’80s production design and cinematography with more expressionistic “indie film moments” that pull away from the larger story. (There’s the artful shot of someone yelling with glee on an empty street at night.)

But occasional stylistic incoherence never derails the film because the emotional core of Francine, Connie, and Rose is so strong. Esposito portrays the three women with the kind of depth that’s normally reserved for male mob bosses, and she repeatedly proves that their decisions are every bit as complicated as trying to decide who to whack. The three actresses give deeply human performances that should remind everyone that the invisible women that these movies love to sideline are more than capable of anchoring their own stories.

“Fresh Kills” premiered at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival. It is currently seeking U.S. distribution.

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Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, tribeca 2023: fresh kills, the graduates, the secret art of human flight.

“ Fresh Kills " stands tall alongside the best post-"Godfather" gangster movies, and it stands apart because of how it focuses on the wives, girlfriends, and daughters of organized crime in a genre that more often pushes them to the margins. Small in scale but rich in character and incident (and brutal violence), it's the debut feature by writer and director Jennifer Esposito , a veteran film and TV actress and a native of Staten Island, New York, where this 1980s-'90s period drama is set. "Fresh Kills" would make a fascinating double-feature with Martin Scorsese's breakthrough feature " Mean Streets ," which is also about a small group of mob-entangled young people grappling with whether to give into the code, social condition, and predetermined life paths handed to them at birth, or rebel and be ostracized (or beaten, or murdered and disappeared). 

It's also packed with details so specific that you suspect that the source wasn't another movie or a book but someone's life—such as the moment when a child goes wandering through a mob-owned business and innocently discovers something a child shouldn't know about; or the nonchalant way that mob-connected teenagers flirt, smoke, carouse, and get in fights outside of a funeral (which tells you how common funerals are in this environment). 

Esposito's direction is clean and efficient—not a lot of cool flourishes here, just a camera that always seems to be the right distance from the emotions it's capturing, and performances that are sensibly modulated whether the characters are whispering innuendo and veiled threats or beating people up. But it's the screenplay that impresses most. This is, in the most complimentary sense, a film obviously written by an actor, with an instinctive sense of what actors need to do their jobs well: motivation, clarity of purpose, and bits of physical business that can help fill in meaning, and add humor and surprise to otherwise grim material. 

As Rose, the protagonist and audience stand-in, Emily Bader fleshes out the familiar role of the trapped young person who wants to be free but doesn't want to lose her family in the process (a story that's more often set in small rural towns, though big-city neighborhoods are functionally similar). The supporting cast gives her plenty to react against, from the swaggering volatility of her chain-smoking older sister Connie (Odessa D'Azion) to the deluded and self-negating loyalty talk of her mom (Esposito, stepping in front of her own camera) to the genial menace of her father ( Domenick Lombardozzi ), who smiles as he tests his family's loyalty by asking, "Do you trust me to fly this plane?" then repeatedly crashes it and expects hosannas and gratitude. 

The film's most intense moments aren't the beatdowns and killings but ones when Rose is put on the spot by another member of her tight-knit community and pressured to make a decision she doesn't want to make. We've learned enough about her world to know that every such decision is ultimately not about her or even about the person doing the asking, but the need to constantly fortify the established order, whether it's by saying yes to a marriage proposal or agreeing not to mention a violent crime that happened in front of you. The TV sets glimpsed in various homes and businesses often show tabloid talk series like “The Sally Jesse Raphael Show,” making a lurid, clownish spectacle of the quiet desperation Esposito's characters are born into and could die trying to escape. The closest equivalent to "Fresh Kills" in overall feeling is probably the HBO version of Elena Ferrante's "My Brilliant Friend," a 1950s period piece set in a small Sicilian town dominated by organized crime, where women got entangled in men's bloody business, even when they tried to keep their heads down and live "normal" lives. 

" The Graduates " is a quiet but wrenching drama by writer/director Hannah Peterson about a rite of passage that shouldn't be one: surviving a school shooting. It follows a group of high school students/gun violence survivors during their final weeks before the end of the school year. Our guide is soon-to-graduate Genevieve ( Mina Sundwall ), who lost her boyfriend Tyler in the massacre, but she's just one part of a thoughtfully fleshed-out ensemble that includes many other students (including Tyler's basketball teammate Ben, played by " Moonlight " star Alex Hibbert, who skipped town and only recently returned, and sometimes still calls Tyler's phone and leaves voicemails on it). Among the grownups, John Cho shines as a basketball coach who stays as cool and pleasant as he can even though his heart has been broken, and gets broken anew each time one of the shooting survivors comes to him for advice or to share good news and he has to think about what they all lost.

There have been a lot of school shooting dramas and documentaries in recent years; that it has become its own genre of movie with certain tropes and images you always expect to see (such as a survivor obsessively calling a victim's phone, or the lockdown drill that re-traumatizes everyone, or the stalker-like shots of school hallways, perhaps first unveiled in Gus van Sant's 2003  Columbine  massacre riff "Elephant") adds to the already mournful experience of watching this film. 

Death by gunfire is now  the number one cause of death for US children and teenagers . It's the quarter-century-long wave of massacres at schools by assailants wielding  handguns, rifles, and shotguns  that pushed death by gunshot to the top of the list. What can be done? The movie doesn't dwell on or even particularly pose that question because it's too busy focusing on what the survivors of gun violence go through in the aftermath. It's questionable whether anybody who thinks things are just fine as they are would even learn of the existence of a film like "The Graduates," much less decide to watch it. But it will speak to those who've been through the horror or know someone who has and realize that the epidemic of gun violence in schools is not an act of God but a problem that could be solved if enough people agreed to try.

" The Secret Art of Human Flight " is the kind of knowingly quirky but sincere indie comedy-drama that might have sold for five million dollars at the Sundance Film Festival back when there were enough art-house theaters and home video companies to recoup the purchase price. Which is not the same thing as saying that it's a great movie—it's okay and sometimes better than that. Writer Jesse Orenstein and director H.P. Mendoza are good at poker-faced goofiness, and there's a characteristically excellent supporting performance by " Sound of Metal " star Paul Raci as the guru who promises to teach a grieving widower ( Grant Rosenmeyer ) how to fly even as he's being investigated on suspicion of murder. The best scenes are the quiet, often philosophy-driven conversations between Raci and Rosenmeyer. 

Matt Zoller Seitz

Matt Zoller Seitz is the Editor at Large of RogerEbert.com, TV critic for New York Magazine and Vulture.com, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism.

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FRESH KILLS (Tribeca 2023) – Review by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas

Named after the Staten Island landfill of the same name, Fresh Kills is a satisfying up-close-and-personal twist on the traditional New York mob movie by actress-turned-filmmaker Jennifer Esposito . Seen through the eyes of quiet, watchful Rose (Emily Bader), this primarily 1990s set family crime drama focuses on her intense and sometimes fraught relationship with her mother Francine (Esposito) and older sister Connie (Odessa A’zion) as their lives are thrown into disarray in the aftermath of her father’s involvement in organized crime.

We first meet Rose and Connie as little girls moving into an enormous mansion on Staten Island, a significant upgrade for the family. As they move into adolescence, they soon learn that word of their father’s shadier business dealings has made it to their school, and while obedient Rose dreams of a future beyond her family, the much tougher, more street-savvy Connie fights back, both figuratively and literally. Guided by their doting yet anxious mother and protective aunt Christine (the great Annabela Sciorra in an award-worthy performance), Rose’s loyalty is called into question in myriad ways as her own frustrated ambition sits in increasing tension with her devotion to her family.

Loosely based on her own recollections of growing up in Staten Island’s organized crime world in the 80s and 90s, as writer and director Espositio brings a nuanced reimagining of the typical mob film by turning attention away from the macho bravado that is so often the centrepiece of these films, converting what is elsewhere typically a female-centric subplot here to the central storyline. She paints an aggressively feminine world of survival, make up rituals and daytime TV, where Francine’s passion for intense floral decor paints a literal backdrop for often heated, emotional confrontations between the family’s women as they struggle to be heard.

Told from Rose’s perspective, the Staten Island that Esposito presents here feels a million miles away from the New York City that the young woman dreams to be a part of, her sense of social isolation subtly constructed and frequently shown in sharp contrast to the more excessive, extreme world of violence which the rest of her family has seemingly accepted as the norm. Bader brings to Rose a thoughtful, quiet intensity, but it is the supporting cast – particularly Sciorra, A’zion and of course Esposito herself – who really flesh the film out, granting it a remarkable emotional density. A compelling and much-needed reimaging of the typical mob film’s gender politics, Fresh Kills reveals Esposito as a confident, assured filmmaker.

• ← WEEK IN WOMEN: Vertical to release Catherine Hardwicke’s PRISONER’S DAUGHTER – Brandy McDonnell reports
• I.S.S. (Tribeca 2023) – Review by Valerie Kalfrin →

Alexandra Heller-Nicholas

Alexandra Heller-Nicholas is a multi-award-winning film critic and author who has published nine books on cult, horror and exploitation cinema with an emphasis on gender politics, including the 2020 book ‘1000 Women in Horror, 1898-2018’ which was included on Esquire Magazine’s list of the best 125 books written about Hollywood. Alexandra is a contributing editor at Film International, a columnist at Fangoria, an Adjunct Professor at Deakin University, and a member of the advisory board of the Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies (LA, NYC, London).

Fresh Kills

Annabella Sciorra (Christine) Jennifer Esposito (Francine Larusso) Odessa A'zion (Connie) Domenick Lombardozzi (Joe Larusso) Luciana VanDette (Lily) Nicholas Cirillo (Allie) Emily Bader (Rose) Nicole Ehinger (Angela) Stelio Savante (Nello) Ava DeMary (Danielle)

Jennifer Esposito

Follows the story of the loyal women of an organized crime family that dominated some of the boroughs of New York City in the late 20th century.

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Fresh kills.

Directed by Jennifer Esposito

Follows the story of the loyal women behind the mob men who loomed over New York City in the late 20th century.

Annabella Sciorra Domenick Lombardozzi Odessa A'zion Jennifer Esposito Emily Bader Nicholas Cirillo Ava DeMary Stelio Savante

Director Director

Jennifer Esposito

Producers Producers

Jennifer Esposito Leslie Ann Owen Todd Sandler Samantha Sprecher Alexis Varouxakis Christine Crokos

Writer Writer

Editor editor.

Todd Sandler

Cinematography Cinematography

Ben Hardwicke

Executive Producers Exec. Producers

Michael Bassick Michael Laundon Ali Sabet

Production Design Production Design

T.V. Alexander

Art Direction Art Direction

Casey McCoy

Stunts Stunts

Victoria Lee Parella

Releases by Date

16 jun 2023, releases by country.

• Premiere Tribeca Festival

120 mins   More at IMDb TMDb Report this page

Popular reviews

Review by Allison M. 🌱 ★★★½

TRIBECA 2023

What makes Fresh Kills so powerful is that it focuses on the women in a mafia story that takes place in the '80s and '90s. Strong performances, strong story, and a strong directorial debut from Jennifer Esposito (who also wrote, starred in, and produced the film).

Vegan alert: -Shrimp cocktail -Fur coat -Leather car seats -Dozens of birds mysteriously fall from the sky -Milk on table

Review by Scoobs ★★★

The power of women omfg. The relationship between Connie and Rose was the backbone of this film. Definitely reccomend checking it out.

Review by ChiefMcMurphy ★★

@San Diego International Film Festival 2023 Jennifer Esposito's debut film was definitely not for me. It just felt so long for the very few things that happened; the pacing wasn't great. Honestly, it could've benefited from a shorter runtime because the plot didn't do anything for me. I gotta say I am a bit disappointed because I was so excited for this one, and it was mostly bland. The idea was great; we get to see a movie where we follow the story of the women who are married to mob men, and on paper, that idea sounded insane with an almost unexplored territory to do whatever she wanted, but it just lacked motivation in my opinion. We follow the…

Review by jack t ★★★½

the sopranos if aj was a girl and tony wasn’t seeing dr melfi

Review by clairek42 ★★★★½

Went into it excited for ✨🔪lady crimes🔪✨ and left on the verge of tears because 💔SISTERS💔

Review by Q :) ★★★★

I did the Q&A for this at Tribeca! So much fun with an audience, loved hearing everyone laugh and gasp along with the film. Esposito was so moved she cried.

Review by AJ_Gatrell ★★★★★

Lotta great performances but the Nirvana song was a choice

Review by sam hebert ★★½

Cleveland International Film Festival 48 i’ll start by saying that, despite the list of complaints below, i quite enjoyed watching this movie. fresh kills  is interested in telling a stereotypical mob story from one of its most stereotypically ignored perspectives: women’s. consequently, we, like the women in this story, are held at some remove from the mobbish goings-on that constantly threaten to derail the larusso family’s happiness, safety, and security, and that decision makes sense. Like the mob wives and daughters, we only see the money after the blood is washed away. this structural conceit is probably fresh kills ’ strongest asset, but much of the rest of the film is too muddled to successfully stick its landings. 

foremost among my complaints…

Review by LucastheH ★★★★

Should have called it The Godmother

Review by h ★★★½

odessa’s performance as connie… now THAT is acting

Review by VComplex ★★★½

disturbing, bleak, authentic. Great directorial debut by Jennifer Esposito

Review by jujupoo ★★★½ 2

San Diego International Film Festival 2023

A good movie to pop my film festival cherry. Also, the main actor showed up in an anime hoodie so bonus stars.

For real though, I wanna do a serious review when I have the time to.

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Colman domingo pays tribute to the late chadwick boseman & andré leon talley with met gala look, jennifer esposito makes directorial debut with ‘fresh kills’; the first film financed and traded by global fan base.

By Valerie Complex

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EXCLUSIVE: Actress Jennifer Esposito will make her directorial debut with the independent feature film Fresh Kills . 

In a groundbreaking departure from traditional film financing, the Fresh Kills production will be financed by an offering on the Upstream Exchange, which today announced a $3.5 million Initial Public Offering “IPO” of securities by Fresh Kills, Inc. 

The film tells the story of the loyal women of an organized crime family that dominated some of the boroughs of New York City in the late 20th century. The screenplay was written by Esposito, and is inspired by life as a young woman growing up in Staten Island, NY. Fresh Kills is produced by Alexis Varouxakis ( Good Time ) and Christine Crokos ( Pimp ). Esposito will also serve as a producer, and Jason Weinberg as executive producer. 

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This will be the first feature film financed and traded by a global group of fan investors via this first-of-its kind IPO on Upstream – the revolutionary Ethereum -powered digital stock exchange powered by Horizon Fintex and MERJ Exchange Limited.

“When I took the concept for Fresh Kills to film financiers and distributors, I was told that financial backing depended on having a male lead in the film, as well as a male director, despite the fact that it is the story of women in the mafia world,” said Esposito. “In addition to lifting up the stories and voices of women, I hope that Fresh Kills will become a social movement. Together with Upstream, we aim to be healthy competition for bigger budget films by mobilizing people to choose character-driven content they can now be part of from the beginning as film investors.”

Apart from purchasing Fresh Kills’ securities, fans in the United States and worldwide can support the Fresh Kills film and movement by purchasing “FRESH NFTs” ( nonfungible tokens) which feature opportunities related to the film, as well as images, videos, or content from the film, cast and crew. Additionally, accredited investors” in the United States may purchase Fresh Kills’ securities sold in an offering exempt from the registration requirements set forth in the Securities Act of 1933 pursuant to a Regulation D, Rule 506(c) offering.

“We are thrilled to announce both the launch of Upstream and the launch of Upstream’s first fan-driven IPO for Fresh Kills ,” said Horizon President Mark Elenowitz. “Our mission to provide everyone with equal access to investment opportunities echoes Fresh Kills’ mission to highlight a funding path for women, minorities, and other groups that are often overlooked in the film industry.”

Horizon CEO Brian Collins adds to this by stating, “Upstream introduces what we believe to be the future of trading, featuring some of the highest levels of transparency, accessibility and investor protections enforced using Ethereum blockchain technology,” he said. “These innovations include direct access to Upstream through the Upstream trading app, best bids and offers displayed on a public order book, advanced design to prevent market manipulations like short-selling, along with FDIC-insured USD accounts.”

Anyone outside the United States and Canada 18 and over may buy the Fresh Kills’ securities through the Upstream app using PayPal, USDC stablecoin, or traditional bank payments. These shares become available to trade with other non-U.S. based investors on the Upstream app after the IPO closes.

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World Premiere

Fresh kills, spotlight narrative, new york, women, drama.

The women of the Larusso crime family are no strangers to adapting to tough circumstances. In the wake of their world being unexpectedly uprooted, these women learn to fend for themselves in New York City during the late 20th century, even with the cards stacked against them. Led by their unsteady but loving mother Francine ( Jennifer Esposito ), two very different sisters — destructive Connie ( Odessa A’zion ) and dutiful Rose ( Emily Bader ) — are the next generation of women who must grow up in this turbulent world controlled by unspoken rules that dictate who they are and who they become.

Written and directed by first-time filmmaker Jennifer Esposito, this gritty mob drama with a feminist twist provides a layered, original look into the dynamics of a crime family by focusing on its usually invisible female members. With strong performances across the board — including powerful supporting turns from Annabella Sciorra and Domenick Lombardozzi — this gripping crime saga shows that ambition and violence are not solely the purview of men in the world of organized crime.––Karen Kemmerle

Cast & Credits

Jennifer esposito, screenwriter, cinematographer, us sales contact, international sales contact, press contact, tribeca festival partners, presenting partner, signature partners.

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Fresh Kills – Watch a clip from the new film from Jennifer Esposito

Posted by Phil on Jun 14, 2023 in All , drama , Film , thriller , Trailers | 0 comments

The daughters of the Larusso family struggle to break the unspoken code of the women behind the men in the mob world of Staten Island in the late ’80s and early ’90s. Unlike any mob movie you’ve ever seen before, FRESH KILLS reveals the women behind the men. The stories never told. Violence, fear, and unspoken rules dictate who they are and who they are allowed to become.

Written and directed by Jennifer Esposito , the film stars Emily Bader, Odessa A’zion, Jennifer Esposito, Domenick Lombardozzi, Annabella Sciorra, and Nicholas Cirillo .

Fresh Kills has its World Premiere in the Spotlight Narrative Section at the 2023 Tribeca Festival.

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Tribeca Film Festival Review: ‘Fresh Kills’ Leaves You with a Stale Feeling Despite a Unique Perspective

Mob dramas almost always focus on men. We see the husbands and sons in families off galavanting, pulling jobs, living the good life. Then, it’s time to pay the piper. That’s just how it goes. Now, we have something with a different angle on that story in Fresh Kills . The filmmaking debut of actress Jennifer Esposito , it’s a mob tale, but from the perspective of the women surrounding the men. It’s a strong starting point, but unfortunately, it doesn’t add up to much, ending as one of the more disappointing titles at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival.

Fresh Kills doesn’t do enough with its premise. Sure, we have individually strong moments, but a bloated running time, as well as a meandering focus, prevented me from ever locking in with it. Now, I’m admittedly not a devotee to the mob genre in general, so a movie like this isn’t subverting something I adore or anything. That alone may make the flick work better for others. For me? it just came up short.

For the Larusso family, moving from Brooklyn to Staten Island was supposed to be a fresh start. It was meant to benefit everyone. In particular, wife and mother Francine (Esposito) would be further away and less likely to see to what her husband Joe ( Domenick Lombardozzi ) does for a living. She’s not dumb, she knows he’s a mobster, but the hope is that a better life for her daughters will be what matters. Unfortunately, she immediately finds out that they now live next door to Joe’s mob associate Nello ( Stelio Savante ). They haven’t escaped anything. Siblings Connie ( Odessa A’zion ) and Rose ( Emily Bader ) are going to be just as in the shadow of crime and violence as ever.

As the sisters grow up, they become very different people. Connie rebels at every opportunity, while Rose tries to play the part of a good woman, in all aspects. The former loves and defends her father, while the latter can’t quite reconcile his criminal activities with who he is at home. In the middle? Francine, always close to the breaking point.

The cast does a solid job of making you feel like you’re within the family dynamics. Someone like Domenick Lombardozzi has been a familiar face for years, though this is a slightly different kind of character for him to play. Jennifer Esposito takes a plum supporting role, though you do wish that you got in her head a bit more. As for Odessa A’zion and Emily Bader, they fare the best, creating two very different sides of the coin. You just wish the script gave them a bit more to do. In addition to Stelio Savante, the supporting players include Annabella Sciorra , among others.

Jennifer Esposito writes and directs Fresh Kills , and while the flick comes up short for me, there’s enough talent here to think she has a bright future in filmmaking. The actress has the germ of a great idea and directs her cast well, so with a better sense of pacing and a bit more meat on her story’s bones, she’d have something. Don’t sleep on what she does next.

Fresh Kills isn’t bad, by any stretch, but it does disappointingly little with its premise. Now, I’m keen to see what Esposito does next, especially since this is a first film. As it stands, it’s not a Tribeca title that I’m keen to revisit. Your mileage may vary, though, especially if mob movies are more your thing than mine…

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Fresh Kills (2023)

Genre: crime / drama, duration: 120 minuten, country: united states, directed by: jennifer esposito, stars: emily bader , odessa a'zion and jennifer esposito, imdb score: 8,4  (85), releasedate: 16 june 2023.

This movie is not available on US streaming services.

This movie is not available on UK streaming services.

Fresh Kills plot

In the 80s and 90s in New York, the Larusso family is active in the criminal world. When mob boss Joe has to go to prison, his wife Francine tries to keep the family together. Their daughters, the destructive Connie and the dutiful Rose, belong to the new generation that must survive in this turbulent world. Unspoken rules dictate their identity and future.

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Joe Larusso

Francine Larusso

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Fresh Kills

• Credits 
• Image gallery  [2]

All images are copyrighted by their respective copyright holders and/or producers/distributors.

• Nicole Ehinger

• Anastasia Veronica Lee
• Judy Wilson
• See all credits
• "Esposito's directorial debut overcomes an occasionally messy story by crafting a beautifully complex relationship between a mother and her two daughters."  Christian Zilko : IndieWire
• "A compelling, overstuffed character study"  John Fink : The Film Stage
• "The veteran actor’s writing-directing debut is an effective drama about the women characters usually left on the margins of organized crime tales"  Dennis Harvey : Variety
• "Esposito's direction is clean and efficient—not a lot of cool flourishes here, just a camera that always seems to be the right distance from the emotions it's capturing (...) But it's the screenplay that impresses most"  Matt Zoller Seitz : rogerebert.com

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Fresh Kill Reviews

A senseless violent offbeat crime drama.

Full Review | Original Score: C+ | Mar 11, 2015

• Entertainment
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Fresh Kills

Fresh Kills: Release Date, Trailer, Songs, Cast

• Release Date in US June 2024
• Language English
• Genre Crime
• Duration 2h
• Cast Jennifer Esposito, Emily Bader, Odessa A'zion, Domenick Lombardozzi, Annabella Sciorra, Nicholas Cirillo, Stelio Savante, Franco Maicas
• Director Jennifer Esposito
• Writer Jennifer Esposito
• Cinematography Ben Hardwicke
• Music Theodosia Roussos
• Producer Jennifer Esposito, Leslie Ann Owen, Christine Crokos, Samantha Sprecher
• Production Fresh Kills Productions

About Fresh Kills Movie

A woman called Francine (Jennifer Esposito), married into a Brooklyn organised crime family, tries to break the unspoken rules of the society for herself and her daughters, Rose (Emily Bader) and Connie (Odessa A'zion).

Fresh Kills Movie Cast, Release Date, Trailer, Songs and Ratings

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Boy kills world rotten tomatoes score gives star a new fresh movie amid 16-year splat trend.

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Bill Skarsgård's John Wick Copycat Shatters 1 Unthinkable Keanu Reeves Record

Harry potter tv remake can finally do justice to a key character from the books (that the movies quickly forgot about), tarantino's 10th movie cancelation repeats his $155 million hit from 9 years ago.

• Boy Kills World earned a Fresh 64% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
• This marks star Famke Janssen's third Fresh score since a long Rotten streak began in 2009.
• Janssen's future Fresh prospects lie more in upcoming TV projects than in movies.

Boy Kills World is helping to reverse a dismal Rotten Tomatoes trend for one of its stars. The action-comedy movie follows the title character Boy (Bill Skarsgård) as he enacts bloody revenge on the people who killed his family in a violent post-apocalyptic future. The ensemble cast of the movie also includes Happy Death Day 's Jessica Rothe, Downton Abbey 's Michelle Dockery, X-Men 's Famke Janssen, District 9 's Sharlto Copley, Stranger Things ' Brett Gelman, It Chapter 2 's Isaiah Mustafa, and the voice of Bob's Burgers ' H. Jon Benjamin.

Rotten Tomatoes has calculated an official critic score for the movie during the weekend of the Boy Kills World release . While it could still fluctuate as more reviews are added, at the time of writing, 73 reviews have been aggregated to give the movie a Fresh 64% score. Excluding her cameo in X-Men: Days Of Future Past, this is the third Famke Janssen movie since 2009 to earn a Fresh score on the platform, alongside her appearances in 2013's The Wolverine (71%) and 2022's Door Mouse (75%).

Does Famke Janssen Have More Fresh Scores Coming Her Way?

The star has two major upcoming projects.

While the movie Boy Kills World has added to her roster of Fresh titles, there is still a way to go if Janssen hopes to reverse this Rotten trend more permanently. While her early career featured a more even blend of Fresh and Rotten titles, after her trio of Fresh scores with Turn the River (62%), The Wackness (71%), and Taken (60%) between 2007 and 2008, 20 of her subsequent movies have received Rotten scores , overwhelming the trio of Fresh movies that she has made in the meantime. Below, see the scores for every Famke Janssen movie since 2009:

Now that the Skarsgård movie has earned Janssen her second Fresh score in two years, her Rotten Tomatoes prospects are turning around. However, it remains to be seen if this will continue. The only upcoming movie in which she is set to appear is the sci-fi horror title The Experiment opposite Rhona Mitra and Stefanie Martini. The movie was announced in 2022, however, so the fact that it does not yet have a release date may not speak to distributor confidence in the project.

The more likely Fresh prospect for the Boy Kills World star is her upcoming television project, the Netflix crime miniseries Amsterdam Empire . However, she has had fewer problems earning strong scores for her TV appearances, as her recent shows The Capture , When They See Us , The Blacklist , and How to Get Away With Murder have all received scores over 60%. On the movie front, it is difficult to discern when her next Fresh title may come.

Source: Rotten Tomatoes

Boy Kills World

Boy Kills World is an action thriller film by director Moritz Mohr, released in 2024. Set in a post-apocalyptic world, a young man simply known as "Boy" lives through terrible trauma after his family is killed by a woman named Hilda Van Der Koy, who currently rules the land. Now older and more bloodthirsty than ever, Boy heads into the fray to claim revenge while liberating the world from her tyrannical grasp.

• Boy Kills World (2024)

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Fresh Kills

Follows the story of the loyal women behind the mob men who loomed over New York City in the late 20th century.

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Movie Score

June 16, 2023,

Jennifer Esposito

Annabella Sciorra, Domenick Lombardozzi, Odessa A'zion, Jennifer Esposito, Emily Bader, Nicholas Cirillo

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Follows a passenger on a train to New Delhi. The train soon becomes a combat battleground as a pair of commandos face an army of invading bandits. Follows a passenger on a train to New Delhi. The train soon becomes a combat battleground as a pair of commandos face an army of invading bandits. Follows a passenger on a train to New Delhi. The train soon becomes a combat battleground as a pair of commandos face an army of invading bandits.

• Nikhil Nagesh Bhat
• Ayesha Syed
• Raghav Juyal
• Tanya Maniktala
• 4 User reviews
• 11 Critic reviews
• 1 nomination

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Boy Kills World review: You deserve better than this

“Boy Kills World is a movie full of loose parts that don't really connect, and it succeeds in only wanting you to watch other, better action movies.”

• Some of the kills are inventive
• Bill Skarsgård's abs
• Derivative story
• Cardboard characters
• By-the-numbers action scenes
• Tries too hard to be cool

When someone uses that old quote, “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” to describe or critique a movie, it’s usually meant as a faint form of praise. It means the creatives involved have done their homework, that the director or writer has liberally borrowed from past movies or tropes to create something, while not entirely original, fresh and entertaining. Think Quentin Tarantino ‘s Kill Bill movies or, less highbrow but almost as much fun, David Leitch’s Atomic Blonde .

A revenge tale as old as time

Boy bores world, a lethal case of deja vu.

After I finished Boy Kills World , I was reminded of that quote in its fullest form and original meaning: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.” But to call Boy Kills World mediocre is wrong; it’s not even that good. It’s bad in ways that numb the soul and insult your intelligence. It’s probably the world’s first tryhard action movie — it so badly wants to be the next cult classic that it doesn’t bother coming up with any interesting characters, coherent plot, or even dynamic fight scenes. It’s a movie full of loose parts that don’t really connect, and it succeeds in only wanting you to watch other, better action movies.

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The plot is a classic revenge tale with barely any new spin on it. As a young child, Boy (Nicolas and Cameron Crovetti in flashbacks; Bill Skarsgård in the present) witnesses the brutal murder of his family, including his beloved mother and sister. He’s rescued by a shaman (Indonesian action star Yayan Ruhian, who isn’t even given the dignity of a character name here) who raises him in the jungle of an unnamed fictional country. Left deaf and mute by the attack, Boy grows up and becomes an expert fighter so that he can gain revenge on the cruel people who killed his family.

Who are these villains? They’re some sort of rich family who own seemingly everything and have absolute power over everyone. There’s Glen van der Koy (Sharlto Copley), an idiot with a Trump-like hairpiece and a tendency to accidentally shoot people; Gideon van der Koy (Brett Gelman), another idiot who fancies himself a writer; Melanie van der Koy (Michelle Dockery), whose only concern is how many people she can kill to boost her TV show’s ratings; and Hilda van der Koy (Famke Janssen), the matriarch who ordered the assassination of Boy’s family and is the object of his revenge.

There’s also June 27 (Jessica Rothe), a mysterious assassin who works for the van der Koy family, and who not coincidentally wears an outfit similar to the The Bride’s yellow jumpsuit in the House of Blue Leaves sequence in Kill Bill Vol. 1 . (That outfit itself was inspired by Bruce Lee’s iconic look in Game of Death ; you see how watered down this movie already is?) She also wears a bike helmet that displays her dialogue across her visor, even though she can speak and does so even when her helmet is still on . Why does she wear this helmet? Because it looks cool. There’s a lot of that in this movie — a preference for cheap, neat-looking visuals over any sense of logic.

Anyway, Bill teams up with two resistance members, Basho (Andrew Koji, whose Warrior series is so much better than this) and Benny (Isaiah Mustafa, who is only speaks gibberish Jive dialogue!) to infiltrate the van der Koy mansion and take them down one by one. Massive amounts of people are slaughtered on the way, of course, and the third act contains the requisite “surprises” that, if you’ve seen Oldboy or any M. Night Shyamalan movie, aren’t really all that surprising.

It’s clear from the start that Boy Kills World has no interest in taking place in the real world and that it wants to be a loopy action-comedy that defies the laws of physics. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course; for what it was, I enjoyed Leitch’s 2022 Bullet Train in all of its derivative glory. But I enjoyed that movie because the plot was clear, the characters made sense and were interesting, and the action scenes connected in a way that were made to the movie’s own internal logic.

Too often, I felt the opposite while watching Boy Kills World . Every character, Boy included, is thinly drawn, and copies of others in the genre. For instance, there’s scene early on that depicts Boy rising from the grave, a shot that virtually matches Tarantino’s in Kill Bill Vol. 2 . (Who, again, borrowed this from other movies in both the horror and action genres). Copley’s character seems straight out of The Running Man , while Dockery’s Melanie is like Faye Dunaway’s Diana Christensen in Network , only more outrageous and lethal.

Rothe’s June 27 might as well be a stand-in for every mysterious female action heroine of the last 30 years: The Bride, Furiosa , hell, even Samus from the Metroid video game franchise . The acting direction for everyone seemed to be to play it at the highest volume, which isn’t that entertaining if there’s nothing different to play to . There are no levels here; it’s all “isn’t this cra-zy?” vibes from beginning to end, and it wears out its welcome pretty quickly.

It’s not just the characters that are the problem. Entire set pieces, like the showdown in the television studio arena that occurs late in the movie, feel lifted from other, slightly better movies. Didn’t The Hunger Games movies do that, but better? Even the action itself seems stilted; it’s like you can tell the point-by-point direction of the fight choreography in each scene. The constantly-swooping camera tries to energize some fights, but it mostly induces nausea.

And sure, the occasional cheese grater to the neck makes for a fine, gruesome visual, but if you’re constantly aware of how everything is being staged, it’s no fun — it takes you out of the fantasy. I was constantly made aware of how this movie was put together, and the scraps of other films it was made from.

Boy Kills World isn’t meant to be taken seriously; it flaunts its video game and comic book aesthetic like a proud teenage boy, and you can tell everyone involved thought it would be awesome to use Bob’s Burgers actor H. Jon Benjamin to monologue Boy’s thoughts, or to clothe their hero in a sick-looking red leather vest that is ready-made for the inevitable action figure.

But great action movies like Kill Bill and Inglourious Basterds , or even mid action films like The Equalizer or Wrath of Man , know that you have to invest in character and story first before earning your cool movie bona fides. Boy Kills World so desperately wants the sauce, but it just winds up empty in the end.

Boy Kills World is now playing in theaters nationwide.

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At a time when anti-Semitic extremists are storming the U.S Capitol, running for office, and declaring war on Jewish people via social media, it might not be the best time for a movie that expects you to sympathize with Nazis. And yet, that hasn't stopped Operation Seawolf from sailing into theaters and on-demand streaming services this month.

The film, which follows the crew of a German U-boat during the waning days of World War II, casts Dolph Lundgren (Rocky IV) as German war hero Capt. Hans Kessler, who's ordered to lead the Nazis' remaining U-boats on a desperate (and likely fatal) mission to attack the U.S. on its own soil. As he and his crew make their way toward New York City in one final bid to turn the tide of war, Kessler finds himself struggling with both the internal politics of the ship and his own sense of duty as the Third Reich crumbles around him.

The Woman King opens purposefully and violently. The film’s first sequence, which brings to life a brutal battle from its sudden beginning all the way to its somber end, is a master class in visual storytelling. Not only does it allow director Gina Prince-Bythewood to, once again, prove her worth as a capable action filmmaker, but it also introduces The Woman King’s central all-female army, sets up the film’s core conflict, and introduces nearly every important character that you’ll need to know for the two hours that follow it. The fact that The Woman King does all of this within the span of a few short minutes just makes its opening sequence all the more impressive.

The level of impressive craftsmanship in The Woman King’s memorably violent prologue is present throughout the entirety of its 135-minute runtime. For that reason, the film often feels like a throwback to an era that seems to reside farther in the past than it actually does, one when it was common for all the major Hollywood studios to regularly put out historical epics that were, if nothing else, reliably well-made and dramatically engaging.

Barbarian is a true swing for the fences. The film, which marks writer-director Zach Cregger’s solo directorial debut, is a horror mash-up that seems in certain moments like a modern riff on The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and at other times like a loving homage to the kind of campy horror comedies that Sam Raimi has perfected. When it’s at its best is when Barbarian feels like it is combining those influences to become a horror ride that is simultaneously absurd and terrifying.

More than anything else, Barbarian is unlike anything else you’ll see in a movie theater this year. That kind of remark doesn’t always equal praise. Uniqueness alone is, after all, not enough to save a movie that is otherwise coming apart at the seams. In the case of Barbarian, though, the film's commitment to delivering a genuinely unpredictable and tonally-challenging experience is what makes it so memorable. To watch it is to get swept up not only in the dramatic stakes of the film’s story but also in the audacious, go-for-broke creative spirit at the center of it.

‘Boy Kills World’ Review: Bill Skarsgård Is a Deaf-Mute Avenger in an Action Film So Ultraviolent It’s Like ‘John Wick’ Gone ‘Clockwork Orange’

Moritz Mohr's first feature draws on a great many sources, from video games to "The Hunger Games," to build a world all its own.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

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• ‘Boy Kills World’ Review: Bill Skarsgård Is a Deaf-Mute Avenger in an Action Film So Ultraviolent It’s Like ‘John Wick’ Gone ‘Clockwork Orange’ 2 weeks ago

In “ Boy Kills World ,” Bill Skarsgård has burning eyes and model cheekbones, sinewy arms popping out of a dirty red athletic vest, and a feral pout that makes him look like Jean-Claude Van Damme crossed with Lou Reed. He plays a deaf-mute avenger, known only as Boy, who kills people in insanely violent ways. Yet through it all, the character retains his innocence. He’s a wounded wild child in a man’s body.

Popular on Variety

So what does it say that in a movie like “Boy Kills World,” that level of cheeky dark sadism has been turned into a pure lark — the new extreme threshold of mainstream entertainment? The fact that this is what we now seek out for kicks may be scarier than anything in “A Clockwork Orange.”

Yet the pop culture of the last 50 years has primed us for it: the slasher movies, the video games, the high-body-count delirium of the “John Wick” series, which may have been the first films to package this kind of relentlessness as cutthroat jollies for the megaplex. The kill-kill-kill spirit of “John Wick” made a film like “Boy Kills World” possible, yet “Boy Kills World” takes it all a step further. It’s the action film as slasher movie as gonzo damaged-superhero movie. It’s a depraved vision, yet I got caught up in its kick-ass revenge-horror pizzazz, its disreputable commitment to what it was doing.

Boy, who can read lips, understands most of what’s happening around him, and he reacts to events by talking directly to us on the soundtrack, in an exaggerated he-man voice (like Mel Gibson’s in “Mad Max”). You could say that the movie, in a way, cheats the fact that he can’t speak, but Boy’s quips-from-his-inner-voice lend “Boy Kills World” a graphic-novel funkiness.

Boy has gone out into the world to right its wrongs, but what’s standing atop the pyramid isn’t the usual stoic power addict. It’s a dysfunctional family of rulers who are at each other’s throats. Mohr, working from a script by Tyler Burton Smith and Arend Remmers, has fun fleshing out these baroque villains. I enjoyed Brett Gelman as the bearded brother who’s like a diamond-district chiseler who thinks he’s a brilliant screenwriter, and Famke Janssen as the matriarch who’s losing her mind. As the dynasty’s media ringleader, Sharlto Copley does his showboat thing (and gets what he deserves). Mohr stages the Culling as the spectacular slaughterhouse version of a winter-wonderland TV commercial. It’s a sequence that would make Alex from “A Clockwork Orange” stand and applaud in glee.  

There’s a big twist — or really, two in one. The state soldier, named June27 (Jessica Rothe), who speaks in slogans flashed onto her digital combat visor turns out to be closer to home than we think. And a character we assume is heroic is revealed to be an emotionally broken monster. All of that succeeds in holding our attention, and the climactic fight — a threesome — is shot and choreographed with brutal visual wizardry. It’s all held together by Skarsgård’s performance, and the trick of it is that you never catch him playing dumb. Yet Boy is often a beat behind what’s happening. That’s what makes us warm up to him; he’s a blood-spattered avenger in spite of himself. He turns the old ultraviolence into child’s play.

Reviewed at Regal Union Square, New York, April 24, 2024. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 115 MIN.

• Production: A Lionsgate, Roadside Attractions release of a Nthibah Pictures, Hammerstone Studios, Vertigo Entertainment production. Producers: Sam Raimi, Zainab Azizi, Roy Lee, Wayne Fitzjohn, Simon Swart, Stuart Manashil, Dan Kagan. Executive producers: Sipho Nkosi, Mxolisi Mgojo, Humphrey Mathe, Bill Skarsgård, Reza Brojerdi, Christian Mercuri, Moritz Mohr, Andrew Childs.
• Crew: Director: Moritz Mohr. Screenplay: Tyler Burton Smith, Arend Remmers. Camera: Peter Matjasko. Editor: Lucian Barnard. Music: Ludvig Forssell, El Michels Affair.
• With: Bill Skarsgård, Jessica Rothe, Michelle Dockery, Jamke Janssen, Sharlto Copley, Brett Gelman, Isaiah Mustafa, Andrew Koji.

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‘Boy Kills World’ Blends ‘John Wick’ with ‘The Hunger Games’ to Hit Hard

The new movie, which stars Bill Skarsgård as a voiceless, vengeful instrument of death, mixes dystopian tropes with a comedy voice-over from H. Jon Benjamin.

Bill Skarsgård in 'Boy Kills World'. Photo: Lionsgate.

In theaters on Friday, April 26th, ‘ Boy Kills World ’ is a revenge thriller that choose to layer dark, madcap humor over its clear ‘ John Wick ’ influence. Powered by a solid, committed central performance from Bill Skarsgård and some entertaining quirk from elsewhere in the cast, it does somewhat fall victim to a thin storyline that gives it much more of a style over substance feel and sometimes comes across as a video game rather than a movie.

Still, with some interesting permutations later in the plot, it does prove to have a little more going on under the surface.

Related Article: Famke Janssen and Brett Gelman Talk Action Thriller 'Boy Kills World'

Does ‘boy kills world’ punch above its weight.

Yayan Ruhian in 'Boy Kills World'. Photo: Lionsgate.

If you only watch one movie this year where Bill Skarsgård goes on a violent rampage intent on wiping out the people who did him wrong… well, we’ve yet to see ‘ The Crow ’, so we can’t tell you whether ‘Boy Kills World' is the better of the two.

But it certainly has a level of originality to put it above a new adaptation of a graphic novel that was first brought to screens in 1994. That said, what we have here is very much a blend of ‘John Wick’, ‘ The Hunger Games ’ with just a dash of a twisted take on ‘ The Karate Kid ’.

Script and Direction

Sharlto Copley in 'Boy Kills World'. Photo: Lionsgate.

Tyler Burton Smith wrote the script here, working with Arend Remmbers to adapt the short film that the latter created alongside director Moritz Mohr.

While Skarsgård’s performance is mute, the screenplay for the movie is nevertheless full of entertaining voice-over from H. Jon Benjamin (‘ Bob’s Burgers ’), who provides an insight into what’s going through his character’s head. Whether it’s quoting from the dictionary that the younger version of Boy studies or commenting on what’s going on, it’s a real highlight of the movie as a whole –– all credit to the team for hiring someone who knows what they’re doing on the voice-over front.

Yet for the most part, the movie is reliant on its fight scenes, and they are certainly numerous, even if they eventually start to make you a little numb. Even with the invention on display here, the sheer brutality of every clash is to such a level that you start to feel battered by it yourself. Still, as the credit implies, it’s fight designer/director and coordinator Dawid Szatarski who deserves the lion’s share of the credit here.

But Mohr, who expands his original concept here, certainly has a lot of flare to spare when it comes to camera moves and performances. It’s clear he and his team were working to a tighter budget than the likes of either ‘Wick’ or ‘Hunger Games’, but he gets a lot out of it.

Performances

Michelle Dockery in 'Boy Kills World'. Photo: Lionsgate.

Appearing in almost every scene (aside from early story moments when the younger version of his character is on screen, played by twins Nicholas and Cameron Crovetti ), Skarsgård brings his typical intensity to the role, and very clearly threw himself into training (he’s essentially carved from stone here) to pull off the various fights.

And his “Boy” is more than simply a savage, revenge-happy warrior –– he’s a damaged personality who has suffered years of trauma and has a mission on his mind (even if it’s not the mission he thinks it is). In tandem with Benjamin’s quirky delivery, it combines to make for a watchable lead role.

As his Guru, Yayan Ruhian channels the film’s anarchic style, bringing a deranged Mr. Miyagi energy to the screens, the world’s most dangerous mentor. He doesn’t have a lot to do besides show off his considerable martial arts skills (you’ll have seen him in the ‘ Raid ’ movies and the third ‘John Wick’ outing), but he does the job well.

On the villainous side of things, we have an assembled group who are clearly having a blast playing atrocious, dystopian autocrats, a collection of paranoid ramblers and scheming social climbers.

Famke Janssen does a lot with relatively little as the power-obsessed Hilda Van Der Koy, one part Hitler, one part Margaret Thatcher. Around her are the likes of Brett Gelman (superbly sleazy as the script-happy brother-in-law Glen), while Sharlto Copley leans into his ability to make smarmy assholes likeable. Well, sort of. But even when he’s at his worst, he’s utterly entertaining.

Michelle Dockery , meanwhile, is creepy on a whole other level as Hilda’s sister Melanie, the real power behind the throne.

And then there’s June 27, played by Jessica Rothe . The star of the ‘ Happy Death Day ’ movies is just as committed as the rest, and proves she’s got the action chops as much as Skarsgård. Plus, she delivers when called upon to show other sides to her character.

Final Thoughts

Jessica Rothe in 'Boy Kills World'. Photo: Lionsgate.

‘Boy Kills World’ is certainly frenetic and action-packed, with a healthy line in dark, zany comedy and some clever ideas.

But in a world where movies such as ‘ Scott Pilgrim vs. the World ’, ‘John Wick’ and other exist, it doesn’t seem as completely original as it might, and it frequently mistakes punching for plot. Don’t let that stop you from checking out something that could use the support, though.

‘Boy Kills World’ receives 6 out of 10 stars.

Boy Kills World

What’s the story of ‘‘Boy Kills World’?

The new movie stars Bill Skarsgård as a young man known only as “Boy”, who vows revenge after his family is murdered by Hilda Van Der Koy (Famke Janssen), the deranged matriarch of a corrupt post-apocalyptic dynasty that left the boy orphaned, deaf and voiceless.

Driven by his inner voice, one which he co-opted from his favorite childhood video game, Boy trains with a mysterious shaman (Yayan Ruhian) to become an instrument of death and is set loose on the eve of the annual culling of dissidents. Bedlam ensues as Boy commits bloody martial arts mayhem, inciting a wrath of carnage and blood-letting.

As he tries to get his bearings in this delirious realm, Boy soon falls in with a desperate resistance group, all the while bickering with the apparent ghost of his rebellious little sister.

Who is in the cast of ‘Boy Kills World’?

• Bill Skarsgård as Boy
• H. Jon Benjamin as Boy’s "inner voice"
• Jessica Rothe as June 27
• Michelle Dockery as Melanie van der Koy
• Brett Gelman as Gideon van der Koy
• Isaiah Mustafa as Benny
• Andrew Koji as Basho
• Famke Janssen as Hilda van der Koy
• Sharlto Copley as Glen van der Koy
• Yayan Ruhian as a shaman

Brett Gelman in 'Boy Kills World'. Photo: Lionsgate.

Movies Similar to ‘Boy Kills World':

• ' Enter the Dragon ' (1973)
• ' Black Rain ' (1989)
• ' Fight Club ' (1999)
• ' Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon ' (2001)
• ' Kill Bill: Vol. 1 ' (2003)
• ' Kill Bill: Vol. 2 ' (2004)
• ' Scott Pilgrim vs. the World ' (2010)
• ' The Hunger Games ' (2012)
• ' John Wick ' (2014)
• ' Warrior ' (2011)
• ' The Raid ' (2012)
• ' Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings ' (2021)
• ' Monkey Man ' (2024)

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Boy Kills World review: Bill Skarsgård excels in weird and gory action movie

It's out now in cinemas.

And now Boy Kills World is here to put its own weird and gory stamp on the genre. Like its protagonist Boy ( Bill Skarsgård ), the movie might be a bit rough around the edges, but when it clicks, it's extremely effective.

When we first meet him, Boy has not had the best life. His family were executed when he was a child by Hilda Van Der Koy (Famke Janssen) and ever since he's been training with an enigmatic shaman (Yayan Ruhian) to seek revenge.

Yes, that means the first act has a lot of training montages, but there's a surreal twist as Boy has frequent drug-fuelled visions, such as long conversations with his dead sister (tremendous newcomer Quinn Copeland).

The fact that Boy is deaf-mute adds another element, with Skarsgård relying on excellent facial expressions alone. He's not totally mute though as his inner monologue is delivered in terrific fashion by H Jon Benjamin, inspired by Boy's favourite childhood arcade video game.

It's an engaging first act, capped in fine style with a bloody, kinetic action sequence as Boy's first attempt at revenge doesn't quite go to plan. He teams up with rebels Basho (Andrew Koji) and Benny (Isaiah Mustafa) – who, in a hilarious running gag, Boy is unable to lip-read – and resolves to take down the Van Der Koy crime syndicate once and for all.

From this point on, Boy Kills World doesn't stop moving and plays like a video game, with Boy working his way up to boss level with various members of the Van Der Koy family, including TV producer Melanie ( Downton Abbey 's Michelle Dockery as you've rarely seen her).

Whenever the bullets are flying and the cheese graters are grating (skin, not cheese), Boy Kills World is an enormous amount of fun. It's just a shame that as it nears its third act, it adds in an unnecessary plot development that grinds things to a halt.

Things pick up for a solid final battle which does at least manage to showcase the talents of Yayan Ruhian. But the momentum is gone and you start to feel the length of its 110-minute runtime, which also leaves the movie on more of a downer than its supremely enjoyable and inventive first 70 mins or so deserves.

Either way, it's a promising calling card for first-time feature director Moritz Mohr, and a brilliant action showcase for Bill Skarsgård ahead of this year's The Crow .

Boy Kills World might not be a flawless victory, but action fans will still get a kick out of it.

Boy Kills World is in cinemas now.

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Movies Editor, Digital Spy  Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor.  Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies , attending genre festivals around the world.   After moving to Digital Spy , initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.  

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Cook review: ‘Boy Kills World’ is fever dream of grisly action

O ne of the most violent films I’ve seen in years isn’t derivative. But its pedigree must include films like “The Raid,” “The Hunger Games” and any number of video games, including “Street Fighter.”  

“Boy Kills World” stands on its own, though, as a bonkers comic-book-type film that will appeal to audiences who enjoy gory fight scenes and non-stop, over-the-top action.

Bill Skarsgård stars as The Boy, raised in the jungles by a shaman (played wonderfully by “The Raid” star Yayan Ruhian) who takes various hallucinogens and is a master fighter.

The Boy wants to avenge the deaths of his mother and little sister Mina (Quinn Copeland) so he gladly toughens up with the knowledge that he will kill the person responsible for their deaths. Meanwhile, visions of his sister – who talks with him – haunt him continually.

The Boy grows into a lean, sinewy man, a killing machine bent on destruction and motivated by nothing but revenge.

Elsewhere, the wealthy Van Der Koy family (including an icky character played by Sharlto Copley and the matriarch, Famke Janssen) pretty much run a post-apocalyptic empire where others live in poverty. During an event called The Culling, they dispense with their “enemies” on live television in an event sponsored by breakfast cereal Frosty Puffs.  

All the while, a narrator (H. Jon Benjamin) shares The Boy’s thoughts.

The action scenes are grisly, fast, and beautifully choreographed. Body parts roll. Blood spatters in pools. In every scene, Skarsgård is a wonder to watch.

It’s a delirious, fever dream of a movie served up with incredible action and dark humor. It’s a kind of illustrated novel for grownups who like their stories gritty.

Obviously, don’t take the kids.

Running time: One hour and 51 minutes.

Rated: R for extreme violence, gore, and foul language.

At theaters.

Watch the trailer here .

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