The Grasscutter

This is a very good film, l first saw it about 6 years ago, the video cover is not very good, and the title is a bit vauge, but it concerns a guy who turns supergrass in Ireland and gets a new life in New Zeland.

But the hit men come after him...

I have just been very lucky and found a Video of this film last week......as a very tight drama with plenty of action it`s top notch.

This is a pretty solid thriller involving an ex-UVF supergrass who has moved to New Zealand, only to have his cover blown and have hit men come after him and his family.

Not only does the guy have a new life, but he's got an awful lot of explaining to do to his new girlfriend, and to add to his troubles he's got the New Zealand police after him too, including a cop who suspects what's going on but consistently comes up against the UK's red tape.

The Grasscutter isn't a film you'll watch over and over again, but provides a lot of tension, flashes of extreme violence, and sticks in a few twists to boot. There's a lot of family drama thrown in there too, as out hero's ex-wife isn't too happy at him betraying his fellow country men, but it turns out he had good reason to do so.

The New Zealand landscape, so familiar from Lord of the Rings, is used to good affect here too, and the violence, though happening seldom, is well over the top. I almost gagged while watching the hero pull shards of glass from his shoulder after a failed bomb attempt on his life, and some characters don't just die after getting shot, they visibly bleed to death on camera.

This is a good film and a nice diversion from what I've been watching lately. Who knows how available it is now though, my copy comes from the defunct 23rd Century DVD label.

For anyone interested in the ongoing situation in Northern Ireland this drama is worth seeing. A supergrass is someone who has given information to the authorities necessitating a new identity. Here the informer is from the Loyalist UVF rather than the IRA but his pursuers are just as ruthless.

`The Grasscutter' contains plenty of authentic detail and the spectacular New Zealand landscape, beautifully photographed is worth the price of the ticket but the film soon becomes rather conventional with car chases, fake-looking blood and too much violence for me in a somewhat contrived climax.