Baskin, 2015.
Directed by Can Evrenol.
Starring Gorkem Kasal, Mehmet Akif Budak, Fadik Bülbül, Mehmet Cerrahoglu, Serhat Mustafa Kiliç and Muharrem Bayrak.
SYNOPSIS:
A team of cops investigating a disturbance in an abandoned building discover more than they bargained for.
Imagine, if you will, a clash between the nightmare world of Clive Barker’s imagination and the hellish brutality of a Rob Zombie movie fed through the lens of prime Dario Argento at his most brilliant. Oh, and make it Turkish. Got it? No you haven’t, you’re nowhere near, but you’re on the right path as Baskin is the kind of horror movie that needs to been seen (experienced?) by anybody who has ever claimed they like horror movies.
And the great thing is, if you’re somebody who says you like horror movies but really mean you’ve seen Paranormal Activity and Insidious and quite like Patrick Wilson then you’ll probably hate Baskin and possibly need to talk to somebody to get over it. Alternatively, if you are a seasoned horror veteran and open to all sorts of pleasures of the flesh and the psyche then you’ll likely love Baskin and dearly hope that co-writer/director Can Evrenol doesn’t succumb to the Hollywood machine, replace James Wan for an Insidious/Conjuring sequel somewhere down the line and lose touch with the dark, creative vision he so clearly has and displays throughout this movie.
It must be said that Baskin is not a plot-heavy film; in fact, it’s quite difficult to pinpoint what it is actually about and yet you cannot take your eyes off it as a group of cocky police officers crash their van when answering a call and end up walking to an abandoned police station out in a strange area of town. Sounds solid enough but before they even get to said police station the film has already unsettled you by having one of the policemen freak out whilst using the bathroom to throw up, then he drives his colleagues away in their van, one of the officers falls asleep, there is a weird sing-a-long to a Turkish pop song whilst they drive, another of the policemen tells tales of having sex with transsexuals, there is an accident, they meet what appear to be gypsies who seem to know something but don’t say what. Nothing really amiss with any of that – except for possibly the sing-a-long, which is very odd – but the film has an off-kilter vibe right from the off and Can Evrenol likes to flip the timeline of events around, giving Baskin a dream-like quality that means all bets are off once the main event kicks off.
And it kicks off in style as once the group of hardened police officers find their way into the abandoned police station the film cranks up the madness factor and what was once a weird but somehow enthralling police investigation becomes a blood-curdling nightmare as the symbolic cooking of meat on a hot grill seen at the beginning of the film becomes the reality – or perhaps not – of the men trapped inside what could well be a Goya painting made flesh, where what were formerly men of authority and strength are reduced to crying, screaming wrecks of their former selves, forced to copulate with deformed beings and have their eyes gouged out in order to free their souls from the drudgery of being alive.
Or something like that, because the final act of the film, whilst graphic and violent to the extreme, is also where any semblance of a narrative falls away and we’re left with dialogue that could have come from the mouth of Pinhead in a later Hellraiser sequel. It doesn’t make any sense, and it doesn’t really have to, but if you had been able to follow the shifted timelines and twisted logic this far then some muttered words about souls and other mystic stuff by a bald midget with a bizarre look (actor Mehmet Cerrahoglu suffers from a rare skin condition that gives his face an unusual appearance) probably won’t make much difference.
Once it is all over you are left to contemplate what you have just seen, to try and formulate some sort of perspective and explanation of the events that you have just witnessed – and you do feel like you have just witnessed something as if you were in the room with the characters – but you can’t and that is the strength of Baskin, as it was with Suspiria, Eraserhead and Antichrist, where nothing is easy and the filmmakers make you work and almost dare you to try and make sense of it all. You won’t, but with Baskin you will have the thrill of having just seen a new director lay down the template for a very exciting and challenging career in the horror genre and that is something that needs to be celebrated and encouraged. Baskin may not be for everyone but it will push the buttons of anybody looking for something a little stronger than the average mainstream horror movie.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Chris Ward
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https://youtu.be/b7Ozs5mj5ao?list=PL18yMRIfoszEaHYNDTy5C-cH9Oa2gN5ng
Originally published July 14, 2016. Updated April 15, 2018.
