The Seasoning House

A powerful kick in the guts.

The first frame of the film reads '1996 - Balkans'. By that time the 'Dayton Agreement' had been signed, yet Slobodan Milosevic, the president of Socialist Republic of Serbia (Serbia, current) and Ratko Mladic (commander-in-chief of the Army of Republika Srpska) continued the ethnic cleansing by setting up 'sex camps' for the Serbian Army where twenty to fifty thousands of Bosniak (Bosnian Muslims) women were systematically raped to intimidate, humiliate and produce a generation of Serbs, all with a political agenda.

"The women knew the rapes would begin when 'Marš na Drinu' was played over the loudspeaker of the main mosque. 'Marš na Drinu,' or 'March on the Drina', is reportedly a former Chetnik fighting song that was banned during the Tito years.

"While 'Marš na Drinu' was playing, the women were ordered to strip and soldiers entered the homes taking the ones they wanted. The age of women taken ranged from 12 to 60. Frequently the soldiers would seek out mother and daughter combinations. Many of the women were severely beaten during the rapes." - Seventh Report on War Crimes in the Former Yugoslavia: Part II, US submission of information to the United Nations Security Council.

This is a story of one such sex camp.

What I learned from Sarajevo was to stop complaining about anything.

What I took from the film is that it takes one tough cookie to absorb it all in and then explode with a vengeance in the enemy's face.

This film was brutal, graphic, emotional, and shocking in parts. The story was well written, and well acted. Sean Pertwee plays the part of a mean and horrible army officer, and I found myself hating him so much - I put that down to how well he played the part. The main character ("Angel" played by Rosie Day) was also played perfectly, as she doesn't speak a word in the whole movie, so the role relies on her acting ability, which she does so well. Some parts of this film are brutal and gory, but that makes this movie even better as it shows the emotion of the story line, which in my opinion is portrayed perfectly in these scenes. The first 15 minutes of the film set up the plot - and it is pretty confronting. I felt emotions that I haven't felt for a while from watching a film, and with every new scene I was heavily involved and interested to see how it turned out. I have to say this film is one of the best drama/horror movies I've seen in years. I would have to give it a solid 8.5 out of 10. Highly recommend it, just do not have children in the room when watching it.

In the directorial debut of special effects guru Paul Hyatt, young actress Rosie Day plays Angel, a deaf and mute girl who sees her family brutally murdered before she is dragged to the eponymous Seasoning House, where kidnapped girls are forced to into prostitution for soldiers of a bleak and senseless Balkan war. The first half of the film has a very dream-like quality to it, as Angel, who is enslaved to care for the prostituted girls, performs her daily routine of doping the victims, and then cleaning them up after they have suffered the soldiers often disturbingly brutal attentions. Hyatt has said he was heavily influenced by Pan's Labyrinth, and it certainly shows in this half as Angel silently wanders the seasoning house and we glimpse the world as she senses, or more accurately, doesn't sense it. But when ruthless soldier Goran, played by Sean Pertwee, and his men arrive on the scene, the same soldiers responsible for murdering Angel's family, she takes drastic action and the film swerves from darkly depressing, to a taut, tense and brutal game of cat and mouse. Rosie Day does well in the lead role, her character, subdued and distant in the beginning, shows signs of life as she recalls memories of her family, slowly bonds with one of the prostitutes who fortuitously knows sign language, and eventually comes to her aid as she suffers horrifically at the hands of one of Goran's men, the monstrous Ivan, while Goran himself is a fittingly cruel and tenacious main villain. The savage scenes of rape in the first half are offset by the brutal acts of revenge and survival in the second, each accompanied, as you would expect, by some great visual effects, but while the film is engaging throughout and comes to a satisfying conclusion, it felt slightly disjointed and meandered in places. However, that doesn't ever detract from the overall tone of the film, darkly foreboding and laced with a palpable sense of menace, it's a tense and disturbing ride.

The Seasoning House is a raw, powerful and, frankly, brilliant film. I recommend it, but it's not a date movie.

Hyett has clearly learnt a lot from his time on other film sets. The Seasoning House is a carefully crafted and controlled film which, at times, almost goes too far, but somehow manages to pull itself back from the brink. The direction is excellent, with Hyett infusing the first two acts with a slow, dreamlike, almost ethereal, feel that may reflect either Angel's resignation to the life that she now tolerates or the state of perpetual drug-based anaesthesia that the girls are constantly under.

Rosie Day is an absolute revelation. She is incredible as Angel and, although she doesn't utter a single word, her face tells us everything and we are never lost as to what Angel is feeling. It's notable that this is also Day's feature film debut. As such, and based on her performance here, I would expect to see a lot more of her in the future

The rest of the cast do a superb job. Willem Dafoe-alike Kevin Howarth is outstanding and tackles the role of Viktor with real conviction and we are torn between hating him (deservedly so) and as the film goes on, rooting for him. Sean Pertwee, as militia leader Goran, has never been more menacing, while Dominique Provost-Chalkley gives a brave performance as Vanya, especially considering all that the role entails.

It's bold cinema, make no mistake, and not a film to be taken lightly. Hyett's film is an uncompromising, unflinching and brutal glimpse into a real-life world of suffering that we, living out our comfortable little lives, simply cannot fathom and subsequently ignore. Hyett should be commended on making this film as honestly as this one. It's a film that sticks with you long after the credits have stopped rolling.

"The Seasoning House" was really not what I had expected it to be from the movie cover. But I must say that I wasn't sorely disappointed that the movie turned out to be something other than what I had thought it to be.

This movie is brutal, not just visually, but also emotionally. Especially because the movie is shot the way that it is, and it is nicely edited. There is just something very realistic, albeit horrible nonetheless, to this movie, and that is really what makes "The Seasoning House" work out so well.

The story is about a group of young girls brought to a remote house, against their will, where they are forced into servitude and have to perform sexual acts for customers that frequent the house. The mute girl Angel (played by Rosie Day) works the house as a helper, also against her will, when fate brings those who killed her family to the house, and things spiral out of control, as fate deals Angel an unforeseen card.

Now, "The Seasoning House" is a very brutal movie, as I mentioned before. Visually because of the scenes portrayed and the horrors that take place in the house where the girls are kept as slaves, drugged and abused. And emotionally because of the events that unfold in the story, and also because the characters are characters you can relate to and very quickly build up some kind of empathy or antipathy for very quickly.

Director Paul Hyett managed to put together something really unique here, and this is definitely a movie that you need to watch. And once watched, it is most likely a movie that will stick with you for a long time afterwards.

The cast were doing great jobs, although the English language with a pseudo-Eastern European accent wasn't really doing the trick. But it was a minor inconvenience, because the rest of the movie overshadowed this flaw.

"The Seasoning House" is well worth watching, despite it being rather grotesque in its story and imagery. But it just goes to prove that movies doesn't all have to be glamor and happy days...