Bereavement (2010)

Director: Stevan Mena

Writer: Stevan Mena

Composer: Stevan Mena

Starring: Michael Biehn, Alexandra Daddario, Brett Rickaby, Nolan Gerard Funk, Spencer List, John Savage, Peyton List, Kathryn Meisle, Valentina de Angelis, Greg Wood, Ashley Wolfe

More info: IMDb

Tagline: There are some evils...so unspeakable...they will scar you forever.

Plot: In 1989, the boy Martin Bristol has congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis (CIPA), a rare neural disorder, in which the patient does not feel pain, heat or cold. He is abducted by the deranged serial-killer Graham Sutter (Rickaby) and brought to the Sutter Meat & Poultry, an abandoned meat-packing plant in Minersville, Pennsylvania, where Graham slaughters young women that he kidnaps. Five years later, the stubborn seventeen year-old teenager Allison Miller loses her parents and moves to the house of her uncle Jonathan Miller that is located near to the decrepit plant. Jonathan, his wife Karen and their little daughter Wendy welcome Allison, but the teenager does not give much attention to her new family. Allison likes to run alone on the road and she passes by the meat-packing plant and then she meets the mechanic William "Billy" and has a crush on him. Jonathan advises Allison to avoid running near the old factory and Billy, who is a problematic teenager. Allison does not listen to her uncle and brings tragedy to the Miller family.

My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again? No.

I know this is subjective but there are times when a movie should take more time to ground itself in reality.  Some horrors work better that way and I feel like the story for this one should have been more refined to make it more plausible.  The serial killer is a bit over the top.  It's explained at the outset that the child, Martin (List), has a rare condition where he cannot feel pain and that he would be unable to survive without being regularly checked for cuts, bruises, etc.  He's 6 when we're told this.  5 years after being abducted by serial killer Graham (Rickaby), he's doing just fine.  What's more is we get scenes where Martin rests his hand on broken glass in a window which severely pierces his hand.  How would Martin survive all these years with Graham AND in Graham's large dwelling with lots of weapons, tools, etc.?  Am I nuts in thinking this is a plot issue?  That's a big problem in my book.  The big showdown at the end was pretty neat and I really dug that a lot of people die that you wouldn't expect.  The tag at the end continues the implausible but would have been OK if more attention would have been paid to the details.  There is a sequel, MALEVOLENCE (2003), that picks up with Martin 5 years later.  I'm going to pass on that.