Linbeymusol
Wonderful character development!
Cathardincu
Surprisingly incoherent and boring
Beystiman
It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.
adrimir
Until this movie and after, absolutely all the movies with psychopaths are a joke. Hollywood movies, horrors, gore films, psychological thrillers and so on are pitiful. None can surprise the reality of a psychopath, more frightening than any fiction, like this movie. Now, I only want to miss this nightmare, although I am proud to have healed myself from any pseudo- psychological understanding of the psychopath. I recommend it the ones less weakest heart in order just to get rid of the same delusions as mine, about the 'humanity of psychopath' - the oxymoron that creates the illusion that you can deal with a psychopath untouched of psychic traumas if you are lucky enough not to be killed by him from pure pleasure.
smoffat-78647
This movie is good in the fact that it portrays the bleakness of sub-lower class, poorly educated living. The filming makes its points and for that part it is a good film. What I object to is the "based on true facts" aspect of the film. It portrays Jamie as being a victim of the whole mass murders. He was crown witness and presided over at least 10 of the murders. He was no victim, he is a coward and should always be remembered as such. He murdered too. That is what makes this movie such a sad "real" story.
Spikeopath
The press junket and first wave of critical notices built Snowtown up as a throat ripper that will cause you nightmares. That didn't do it any favours as per expectation levels for the horror enthusiast. However, this is a superb piece of film making, a real gritty and grainy deconstruction of the human condition gone sour. As with all films of this type that are based on real life incidents, it pays to read up on the facts if you be so inclined. Debut director Justin Kurzel doesn't shirk from the horrors of the case, but skillfully he doesn't bang everyone over the head with shock tactics to grab the attention. It's a relentlessly bleak picture, there's a continuous build of impending dread, of human devastation wrung out by a master manipulator (Daniel Henshall as John Bunting superb), the depressing story told through the eyes of the simple and confused Jamie Vlassakis (Lucas Pittaway).Not to be watched if one is looking to be cheered up! But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be sought out as essential cinema. It's a strong and potent film, worthy of inspection by adults who understand that not all film is about entertainment. 8.5/10
Leofwine_draca
SNOWTOWN is a true-life story about a serial killer and his associates who were prevalent in Australia during the 1990s. A low-key production that goes for gritty realism above everything else, the film this most reminded me of was HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER; it has the same level of harrowing and distressing subject matter while being incredibly powerful at the same time.SNOWTOWN isn't quite up there on a level with HENRY - there are a few too many scenes of people sitting around and eating for a start - but it is an undeniably effective movie. The casual brutality of the movie will make this hard to sit through for many viewers, with the scene involving the dog being particularly gruelling; meanwhile, the bathtub sequence is one of the nastiest I've ever witnessed. Aside from these moments, the rest of the movie is surprisingly restrained, a slice-of-life exploration of how 'white trash' get on with their lives.The acting is fine, particularly from Daniel Henshall in a star-making performance, and the script is very good. I wish there had been a little more resolution at the end but then you can't have everything. SNOWTOWN is about as far away as you can get from a mainstream Hollywood movie and it's all the more effective because of that. And I'll reiterate how incredibly grim it is: would I sit through it again? Not a chance!
