Go With Me ~ Subtle Drama and Authentic Horror

"Some people are just bad."

If you go by the few newspaper critics who bothered to review it, "Go With Me" was a "lethargic" failure masked as a revenge thriller. I'm glad I didn't read the reviews. I found this film, originally released in earlier this year under the title "Blackway" (also the title of Castle Freeman's novel from which this film was adapted), was a subtle drama building to a sudden and satisfying climax of vigilante payback.

Both Anthony Hopkins and Hal Holbrook offer moments of stunning excellence as actors in a film filled with a cast of secondary actors who provide strong portrayals of people who are either in terror of or in the thrall of a smalltown psychopathic gangster named Blackway played by Ray Liotta. For his part Liotta falls somewhat flat as the psychopath until his last appearance, when he visually displays an unhinged insanity that he had kept under wraps throughout the film.

Building upon a series of revelatory flashbacks, "Go With Me" allows the camera to trail along with lumberyard workers Lester and Nate as they search for the psychopathic Blackway, presumably to "persuade" him to cease his harassment of newcomer Lillian (Julia Stiles). Moving just beyond the initial terror of Blackway's dangerous violation of Lilluan's life, the film caught my interest by building upon an early doubt that a mild old man and a timid young man can "talk some sense" into a deranged bully. As the film advances so did my realization that none of these three are as "feeble" as they seem. While vigilantism outside of the superhero genre is frowned upon, there is always satisfaction to be found in seeing the victim stand up to the bully--though the delight comes nowhere near to the satisfaction of those early 70s revenge films, the original "Walking Tall" (1973) and "Lipstick" (1976).

I'm glad director Daniel Alfredson avoided the cheap horror stunts, allowing the bullies (there are more than one) to stay down without those "Halloween"-style resurrections. His revenge film was refreshingly real. If you find this one for download or on DVD, it's worth the viewing. Ignore the amateurish and juvenile reviewers online or the West Coast critics.