Prime example: 13 Tzameti, a festival hit back in 2006 that's currently being remade (surprise, surprise) here in the States, as simply 13, although this one's a redo with some credibility at least, considering that 13 Tzameti writer/direct Gela Babluani is also scripting and shooting the stateside version. Meaning, it's in the best possible hands, no matter how the final product's outcome ends up. And the cast is pretty solid: Mickey Rourke, Ray Liotta, Ray Winstone (The Departed's "Frenchie"), cutie Emmanuelle Chriqui, and awesome deranged-character-actor Michael Shannon. Oh, and 50 Cent is in it too, sooo unfortunately, but hopefully his character is the first to bite the huge one. What? He's just an atrocious actor. Why he's even cast in this to begin with isn't worth my energy to ponder.
Shot in black-and-white, 13 Tzameti is centered around one great idea: Russian Roullette as a spectators' sport. A down-on-his-financial luck immigrant named Sebastian is helping remodel a man's home in the hopes of earning some cash to help his struggling family. Within days of his work, unfortunately, his employer overdoses, lying dead in his bathtub after opening a mysterious letter that a friend told him would lead him to some serious money. Sebastian, having overheard this talk of "serious money," finds the dead man's letter and follows its instructions, which lead him to a secret meeting of gangster-types and suit-and-tied rich folks in a grungy hotel, where 13 players stand in a circle pointing a gun at the player in front of them. Once the moderator gives the word, each player spins the gun's cylinder repeatedly until told to stop. Seconds later, each player pulls his pistol's trigger. The lucky ones, the players that have empty chambers jammed to the backs of their heads, survive to the next round; the others, its wrap city. Standing around the circle of random murder are the aforementioned rich folks, placing bets on who'll live. Gambling, Grim Reaper's style.
What starts out as a run-of-the-mill "guy tries to make ends meet but keeps hitting dead ends" story quickly amplifies into some rather sharp suspense once the hammers are cocked and bodies begin to drop. Spinning the camera around the center of the circle, zooming in on the petrified and exhilirated faces of the numbered-shirt-wearing players, Babluani shoots the game-playing portion of 13 Tzameti like a pro. Which is all the more impressive when you consider that this was the guys first-ever film, and that he made it at the ripe age of 26. The central idea of "killing for sport" is damn bleak, nihilism at play, and gives the feeling that Babluani sees humanity through a pretty bleak lens. Anonymous men drop big bills just to watch unknown lads blow each others' brains out, while the unknown lad players voluntarily put their lives on the line just to make a heavy buck. Money is indeed a thing here.
The ending is a ballsy, sucker-punching downer, too, which is always welcome to me. Happy endings rarely feel "real," what can I say?
I wasn't blown away once the flick ended, though. Highly entertained and partially adrenaline-charged, yes, but not left thinking, "Wow!" The scenes padding the central Russian Roullette stuff serve their purposes storytelling-wise, but are far less compelling and diminish in comparison. To blame here is the film's leading man's minimal on-screen presence. 13 Tzameti is totally Babluani's show, a pretty engrossing ride that maintains its grip thanks to his unpredictable script and fearless direction. The acting, on the other hand, isn't much to write home about, never terrible but rarely commanding enough. Better than the actual overall performances are the faces of the actors here, a collection of some really tough-looking dudes that fits into the barbaric storyline nicely.
Especially lacking in chops, though, is, again, the dude who plays Sebastian, a taller, lankier James Franco look-a-like named George Babluani (ahh, family member nepotism....makes sense now). He's utterly one-note, a problem considering that Sebastian goes through a gauntlet of conflicting emotions and soul-searched-for brutality. It's an interesting character made lifelessly robotic by bland-man George. He only has one facial expression: an open-mouthed daze. Like the one beard-growing friend in Knocked Up...the one that Jason Segel makes fun of for only making one face.
Even though it was made in good ol' France, the flick has a subtle old-school-Hollywood-film-noir feel, mainly because of the black-and-white. Babluani takes his time before exploding into a downhill tumbler of naturalistic shocks. I'd go as far as to say that 13 Tzameti's "money-minded murder" concept is even more chilling than the Hostel films. In those Eli Roth "torture porn" jobs, the gore and can-I-top-myself-with-the-next-elaborate-death zeal crosses the line beyond genuine unease and becomes shock for simply shock-value's sake. The gangster-organized Russian Roullette ring seen in 13 Tzameti comes from a much darker place. Those in harm's way have put themselves there intentionally, taking vulnerability out of the picture. Voluntary self-slaughter. Any innocence is crumbled up and chewed like gum, then spit out like bullets. You're more fascinated as to why these guys would play the game, not sympathetic like you are when watching unsuspecting victims take buzzsaws to their foreheads in Hostel. And I'd take fascination over sympathy any day.
13 Tzameti is its own kind of violent beast, and for that I salute Gela Babluani. It's an original idea executed with unflinching precision. If a stronger actor would've anchored it, it very well could have been an undeniably great film. In time, I'll see if Babluani can solve this flick's problems in his American second try, which will ride on the shoulders of relative unknown Sam Riley, who'll play the "Sebastian" role. Riley apparently brings down the house in the British rock biopic Control, so promise is imminent.
A cool hundred bucks says that the Hollywood brass force Babluani to change the original's ending, though. If he hasn't already on his own. Punishing, unrewarding final scenes rarely fly in these parts, regrettably.
But, yeah, 50 Cent. Fuck. Can somebody stick him for his SAG card pronto.
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