Sunday 1 August 2010

Film Review: DONKEY PUNCH (2008)


Co-writer/Director: Oliver Blackburn
Running time: 99 mins (approx)
Certification (UK): 18

UK release date: 18th July 2008

Watched on Sky+ Sunday 1st August 2010.

PLEASE NOTE: THERE MAY BE SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW.

A friend of mine said he was going to watch this one when it aired on TV recently and so I decided I’d record it and give it a viewing. Being of a much greater age than my pal it’s not the kind of film I would usually choose to watch, but I thought I’d give it a chance anyway.

A group of three teenage girls, Lisa, Tammi and Kim, are on holiday in Mallorca. They all agree it’s to be a girls’ only weekend, but that’s before they meet the boys, Sean, Bluey and Josh. They find out that the boys are in charge of a yacht in the harbour and the girls agree to go back with them where they meet Marcus, the engineer. With drink flowing, they soon start to turn the music up, but they don’t want to be reported to the harbour master so they decide to go out to sea. All seems to be going well when Bluey, a DJ, brings out the drugs. These relax everyone and the conversation soon turns to sexual practices, one of which being the Donkey Punch of the title. One thing leads to another and as the sun sets two of the girls are making out with three of the boys in the cabin. But things are about to go disastrously wrong when one of their number is killed accidentally at the hand of another. Events now take a drastic turn as they desperately try to cover up this mistake. I won’t say any more as I don’t want to give too much away.

Although there is a rather claustrophobic feel to this film, I found myself slowly drawn in to the drama as it unfolded. Quite well made with a plot that moves along quite rapidly, although I did find the beginning very clichéd. Good performances all round, particularly from Sian Breckin as Lisa and Nichola Burley as Tammi. Honourable mentions also go to Robert Boulter as Sean, Tom Burke as Bluey, Julian Morris as Josh, Jay Taylor as Marcus and Jaime Winstone (daughter of actor Ray Winstone) as Kim.

As I said, I was quite easily drawn into the drama of this piece, so that part worked quite well. Unfortunately other parts did not work for me. I found it hard to believe that the owners of the yacht would leave it in the hands of these young men without anybody keeping an eye on them. Also, once the death had occurred, the events that followed seemed a little bit too far beyond reason for me. I guess what we learn from this is that there are ALWAYS consequences for your actions. There is quite a lot of violence, some gore, scenes of sexual violence and drug taking. If that’s your bag, then go for it! For me, it didn’t really work so I can’t really recommend it.

My score: 5.7/10

LINKS:
IMDb Site: http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0988849/
Official Site (UK): http://donkeypunchmovie.co.uk/
Trailer: http://uk.imdb.com/rg/VIDEO_PLAY/LINK/video/imdb/vi3543204633/

No comments: