Hello! New contributor Robert Balkovich here.
For those of us not #blessed enough to nab tickets to the festivals our joy comes from scouring the internet for trailers, stills, reviews, and any other new morsels of info about the upcoming films. Today we've got a new teaser for revenge thriller out of Northern Ireland Bad Day for the Cut, which is premiering in Park City as part of the increasingly prestigious Sundance Midnight selection. Lovers of thick Irish brogues and morally ambiguous murder rampages rejoice!
Slightly NSFW teaser after the jump...
Nigel O'Neill (who kind of looks like Aussie dino dad Sam O'Neil with a bushier beard, no?) is in the Liam Neeson role as a man seeking revenge for the murder of his mother who lead a secret life that seems to be connected to Irish gangsters. Obviously this means we'll be some bloody comeuppance delivered by way of sledgehammer and hunting rifle. What really caught my eye with this trailer was Susan Lynch (recently seen in season 2 of Happy Valley) in what looks like a very meaty role as a female crime boss and/or general sadist. I've grown very weary of the "grizzled old man lets nothing get in the way of saving/avenging one of the helpless women in his life" genre of movies, but the addition of a savage female character in a sea of pasty, bald bad guys with indiscriminate European accents might be just the thing that gives Bad Day for the Cut a leg up over its competitors.
Although it has definitely delivered a few flops in the past (looking at you, Yoga Hosers), for the most part Sundance Midnight has introduced some incredible horror and thriller films into the zeitgeist, and done a lot to help genre films gain mainstream respect in recent years. It has introduced instant classics like It Follows, The Babadook, Under the Shadow, and one of my favorite films in recent years, The Witch. Just based on this first look, doesn't it look like Bad Day for the Cut has a shot to make a real splash in what is becoming a program with a high pedigree?
You can find the rest of the '17 Midnight selections here.