At instances, this slow-burn indie hillbilly thriller looks like a heavy-footed stomp by means of the style. It’s set within the Appalachian mountains, the place a close-knit clannish group lives by its personal guidelines; a lawless backcountry by which a lone girl takes on the meanest household on the mountain to guard her personal, banjos strumming on the rating. It’s not precisely sturdy on originality or authenticity. However what The Satan to Pay does have going for it's a efficiency of actual emotional power by Danielle Deadwyler (greatest recognized for supporting roles in movies such because the Netflix western The Tougher They Fall).
Deadwyler performs Lemon Cassidy, a farmer eking out a dwelling along with her husband and little boy. Life is hard, and will get harder nonetheless when Lemon’s husband goes lacking whereas as much as his neck in hassle with the Runions – a terrifying native household headed up by matriarch Tommy (Catherine Dyer). We meet Tommy in her kitchen, all apple-pie sweetness and giving baking ideas in the identical breath as she threatens to kill Lemon’s son. As a personality she’s a shade too gimmicky, or maybe Dyer goes a bit gentle on the menace; both means Ma Runion by no means feels genuinely scary.
Nonetheless, Lemon seems convincingly scared, eyes saucer-wide with terror. And she or he stays frightened whereas on her quest to seek out her husband and clear his debt. Normally, it appears a stretch when odd individuals turning badass in motion pictures, immediately buying ice-cold killer instincts and a lethal goal. However Lemon trembles as she factors her gun; in each scene she appears afraid for her life. Deadwyler’s soulful efficiency actually grounds The Satan to Pay even because it cranks into revenge-movie mode. That stated, in order for you a slice of grim Americana to hunker down with, I’d go along with Winter’s Bone or Frozen River.
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