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So much average

Excellent but underrated film

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

You've rarely seen a movie like Jerzy Skolimowski's "Essential Killing". Vincent Gallo (of "Buffalo '66") plays an escaped POW from Afghanistan who roams the European countryside in midwinter hoping to be able to survive in this unfamiliar setting. The absence of dialogue - except for a few lines - gives the film an especially surreal feel. There's no particular political message. The message is: when you're on your own, you'd better have your wits about you.This is the first Skolimowski movie that I've seen. I'm impressed. I hope to be able to see more of his movies. In the mean time, I recommend this one.Also starring Emmanuelle Seigner (Roman Polanski's wife).

Taken to an unspecified European country for interrogation after killing three US soldiers, an unnamed terrorist tries to survive after fleeing capture in this unconventional thriller starring Vincent Gallo. It is not an easy to film to watch, and much of what Gallo gets up to (especially with a mother with a baby) may make one feel queasy, but Jerzy Skolimowski's approach in directing the material is refreshingly unique. His protagonist is thoroughly dislikeable at face value: possibly a member of the Taliban and mercilessly killing many along the way. As the title alludes to though, all of his killings are essential, at least in his eyes, and it is hard not to feel for his desperation, heinous as his actions may be. The choice to shoot with minimal dialogue (Gallo never once speaks) and no specific locations works well too as the film gets down to the essence of what it means to survive and live in the heat of the moment, politics aside. Interesting as all this might sound, 'Essential Killing' nevertheless ends on a sadly inconclusive note. The final section of the film (in which second-billed Emmanuelle Seigner finally appears) comes off as extremely implausible too. The benefit of all those flashbacks is likewise debatable since the less we know about Gallo, the more fascinating he is. If flawed, 'Essential Killing' remains daringly different though to the point that it is a hard film not to recommend. The picturesque yet hostile deserted locations, the frequently mobile cinematography and Pawel Mykietyn's eerie score all combine to make a difficult yet hard-to-forget experience.

A visionary and masterful film. There is a story, it just isn't told in the same stock way. I think the story is a poetically-told and profound one. If you want Rambo and sneer at the idea of an "art film", then skip it. You won't know how to watch it and your commentary will be misplaced. If you understand that politics is elemental, consequential, and, yes, essential, and is more than ideologies and labels and bad guy verses good guy frames of reference, you could get something out of it. If you understand that politics isn't just parties or campaigns, but that 95% of it is what people don't see and don't ever know, you may like it. If you understand that politics is really (or had better be) ultimately about the planet, other life forms, seeing people whole, and each man's soul, or at least have an open mind to seeing a more encompassing view of "politics", you might like it. Skolimowski's best, in my opinion, and that says a great deal.

It is or better was, really rough to rate this movie. On one hand you have the powerhouse performance by Vincent Gallo, on the other hand, you have a movie that does not live up to this performance. Of course the intentions were more than good. The story has a few things to say (the animal nature, survival and more), but the movie itself is never coherent enough or driven enough to bring home those points.While it is surely intended to be random (or look random), this is also another fact, that does contribute to the fact, that the movie drags and feels longer than it actually is. There are ambiguous things happening, but overall it is not as subtle as it could and judging by the overall idea, should be. So while it won't appeal to Entertainment hunters from the get-go, it is very likely, that it will repel the target audience too.