Although Thai director Monthon Arayangkoon’s The Victim isn’t exactly a pitch perfect horror-thriller, it’s still a bit criminal that the film was made back in 2006 and is only now getting a release in the UK. The Victim’s strength pulls mostly from the basic and striking nature of its premise: a young actress is haunted by the souls of the victims she portrays in police reconstructions, and after taking on the role of Meen she is slowly pulled into a mess of supernatural terror. A good mix of thriller, horror, plot twists, and a dollop of black comedy make this feature a lot more accomplished as a whole than your average bog-standard ghost story.
Arayangkoon’s
understanding of the composition of horrifying images is obvious throughout The Victim and even when the second half
starts to wobble on plot twists, the visual impact is in no way lessened.
Images of terror here are eerie and startling: faces summoned out of shadow, long
tracking shots through deserted space, the muddling of past and present,
imagined and real. All of these help to push the viewer down a rabbit hole with
the fantastic Pitchanart Sakakorn who’s wrought twisted lead performance stands
out as key to the success of the story.
On the other hand, some of the supporting cast can be less striking;
fading into wooden monotony, but the success of the director’s control over the
involving nature of fear squashes any problems here.
Over-reliance
on CGI in some make-up effects tarnishes an otherwise accomplished
understanding of the subtleties required in striking fear into an audience. The
director’s keen eye is most arresting when he constructs scares comprised
solely of glimpses and shadows and it’s this that is most infuriating when
compared with the TV-movie feel of the more blasé CG scare-tactics.
Problems
kick-in from the big twist that strives for the Shyamalan-effect but squanders
itself somewhere around his later, less striking, work. From the first unveiling
the film slowly threatens to pop its own bubble, the excellent mix of moods and
that wonderful control of visually perfect haunting sequences is somewhat
tarnished by a complicated and rushed last half hour that strives to do too
much with too little and leaves the film unfulfilled. Still, a good strong lead, consistent visual
smarts, and more than enough well-devised scares help leapfrog any lulls in the
plot and mark the feature out as impressive.
Rating: 15
UK Release Date: 6 August 2012
Directed By: Monthon Arayangkoon
Cast: Pitchanart Sakakorn, Apasiri Nitibhon, Penpak Sirikul
Pre-Order/Buy:The Victim On DVD 
Scott Clark