The Devil's Business (2012)

You won't be disappointed!

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Powerful

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

A clear rip-off of Ben Wheatley's KILL LIST, THE DEVIL'S BUSINESS is a hopeless travesty of a film. Shot almost entirely in the dark with mainly just two actors on the screen, it sees a couple of hit-man - a seasoned professional and his rookie apprentice - visiting a house to carry out a hit. Once there they find the place deserted so they sit round for about an hour of screen time, waiting for him to show up.The story is extraordinarily low budget so this needed a fantastic script to make up for it. Sadly there isn't one. The acting is hopeless, particularly on the part of the inexperienced younger guy, but it's the dialogue that crushes the life from this one. There's a ten minute monologue which is one of the dullest ever and has no real connection to the central story, as tenuous as that is. It appears somebody researched the life of Aleister Crowley and decided to do a modern-day version of the tale but the effort is entirely unsuccessful. Indeed THE DEVIL'S BUSINESS is the worst horror film I've seen in a long time, and that comes from somebody frequently exposed to the worst late-night excesses of The Horror Channel.

Story: Two hit men the experienced Pinner (Clarke) and rookie Cully (Gordon) are sent by their boss Bruno (Miller) to take care of Kist (Hansler). The night starts routine but soon takes a turn as they find out that Kist is involved in the occult, can the men complete the job?VerdictHorror: very well played out suspenseful horror leaving almost everything off camera. (9/10)Thriller: You know the job and the twist keeps you on the edge of your seat through out. (9/10)Sound: good off screen sound effects leaving everything in your own mind (8/10)Settings: Basic creepy house, with large over grown garden works great for the genre (9/10)Suggestion: I would suggest watching this its short and sweet (9/10)Best Part: When Pinner is telling Cully a story with a complete emotionless facial expression.Worst Part: Bit short but that works well as it doesn't take the edge of the seat side of the film away.Star Performance Billy ClarkeFavourite Character PinnerSimilar Too: Kill ListOverall: A very effect thriller using very little to create an overall great atmosphere, that both leads carry your attention. The sudden jumps in the story keep you wanting to watch to see what the final outcome will be. A short thriller which can keep you at the edge of your seat without having to using a big name actor or over the top special effects.Rating 84%

Even though it's just over an hour long, this movie is very taut and tense for the majority of it's duration.Two hit men, on a new boy and one a veteran, are waiting for the eponymous Kist, who for some reason needs to be killed. He is at the opera and should be home after midnight.after a few exchanges, the hit men check the area, and find some very disturbing things in the garage, that could indicate some kind of devil worship is going on.After they find the body of a child, they realise all is not well.Kist arrives home and is killed. On their way out of the house, one realises that he has left his watch, on entering the house, Kists body has gone...Yes, the movie is so much like Kill List, that you know that something will change the whole of narrative and the genre before the final act, but, considering the lack of sets and the tight budget, it's very surreal and atmospheric.This is partly thanks to some use of wonderful lighting, and a fantastic monologue by Pinner about Eddie, and his cheating wife.The trouble is that the film gets a little too bonkers for it's own good come the end. I would accept the fact that Kist could be resurrected due to Paganism, but did you really have to go all 'Don't Look Now' at the end.Fans of kill list should see this, for the most part, it's excellent.

The Devil's Business just came across as an extremely low budget made-for-TV movie. It was heavily dependent on the conversation between just 2 people for the majority of the movie duration. In order to carry that sort of setup off you're going to need some top quality acting and while the acting was occasionally decent in this movie, it was also sometimes below average.Both Billy Clarke and Jonathan Hansler gave decent performances for the most part but Jack Gordon couldn't really match them for most of his on-screen time, although there was one scene where he demonstrated his true capability and that just about saved his credibility. Perhaps the scripting for his character was part of the problem. All the actors showed promise but they really needed more time and more takes to film the scenes perfectly. I assume either the budget didn't allow them to do this, or the director didn't spot the potential for improvement.The writing overall was good and could even be considered the stand-out feature, it's just a shame that the budget couldn't be stretched considerably to make this into a real film and bring out the writing with cut-scenes and great cinematography. Instead, nearly all the action takes place in a darkly-lit small house somewhere in England. As a result, the visual imagery is just dull and boring for most of the movie and it gets tiresome rather quickly.The production value was just a notch above the sort of movie a student might make at college or university, it was just so low that it was almost filmed like an episode of some British television show from the 80's, just sadly not with the same sort of entertainment value.All the actors had some passion to their work, the writing was decent, the direction, while flawed, showed promise. But as a complete package, a fairly terrible movie that I just can't recommend. Maybe with a bigger budget it could have been a totally different story..