OFFSPRING

Jack Ketchum is an American author who's novels delve into the dark side of the human condition. He explores themes that few others dare venture and the result is kind of prolific. Several of his books have been adapted into film including The Lost (reviewed recently) and The Girl Next Door (review in photos section). All of his work to date has been no-holds-barred and is guaranteed to shock and offend a lot of people. Offspring tells the story of a nomadic tribe of cannibals who prowl the north-east coast of America. One evening they break into a remote homestead and viciously eat its residents and kidnap 2 women and a baby. A retired cop who spent years trying to track them is called in to hunt them down and the film bounces between the tribe and the police. It's a brutal film and definitely not for the squeamish... as with many of Ketchum's stories, nothing is off limits and children are part of the depravity. You will see feral kids tearing flesh from faces and stripping meat off the bone. I do really like this film, however, I separate it from other Ketchum movies. Where his work is usually grounded in a stark reality, Offspring has a heightened reality that disconnected me from the story. The kids looked like characters from Mad Max 3 and you feel like the whole movie was a simple horror story with violence for violence sake. There is no deep underlying subtext or statement (that I conclude) which on it's own is great but with the Ketchum moniker, the expectation isn't met. Nevertheless it's a nasty, gut wrenching exercise in blood, gore & carnage.

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