BITS 2017: ‘Marauder’- Short Film Review

I had an opportunity to watch the post-apocalyptic revenge short film Marauder. It premiered at the Blood in the Snow Canadian Film Festival this past weekend. I enjoy revenge films, but I am not always crazy about the post-apocalyptic part. The revenge part intrigued me, so I was willing to give it a shot.  Does this film deliver a tale of revenge as promised? Read on to find out!

Synopsis:

In a world ravaged by nuclear fallout and stripped bare from resource wars, a lone MARAUDER wanders the broken highways. She scavenges what little she can find, trading goods for gasoline on her supped up old motorcycle. While trading goods inside the radiation zone, she’s run off the road by two bandits, who steal her bike and leave her for dead, fearing she’s too contaminated to eat. She awakes several hours later, broken down and hell bent on finding the men who took her bike and left her to die. The dying residents of a nearby town point her the direction of the Bandit’s camp in an abandoned gas plant. The Marauder, armed only with an old pistol and 4 bullets, sets out to take back what’s hers by any means necessary.

The Film:

Picture Element presents Marauder. Directed by Brandon Rathbone and written by Jordan Scott. It stars Michelle Haug as the “Marauder”. Matt McKinney as “Gizmo”, Andrew Long as “Hesher”, Kevin Davey as “Doctor” and Pike Klassen as “Cody”. The film is set 50 miles inside of a radiation zone.

The set is definitely Mad Max based. It is a well-done set and you definitely feel you are right there in the thick of the moment. As in most post-apocalyptic worlds, there is no money, everyone scavenges and trades for survival. The Marauder is run off the road by two bandits. They take the bike and leave her for dead. Several hours later, she awakes to find no bike and sets out to seek revenge on the bandits and recover her stolen bike. She not only gets her bike back, she ends up kicking some ass and reaches a dilemma, there are four of them and only three bullets left, what does she do?

Final Thoughts:

I enjoyed this one. It was better than I expected. A little Mad Max, but not in a bad or redundant way. The scenery captured the feel of post-apocalyptic times. There were some really great fight scenes. Which is a huge part of revenge films, no? If you have a chance to check it out, please do. You may keep up to date on their Facebook page. Who knows, they definitely left it open for a longer film or a part two.