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What is Meat Kills About?
Meat Kills is a splatter movie about a bloody conflict between animal-rights activists and a pig-farmer’s family.
Led by an extreme-minded activist by the name of Nasha, a group of animal-rights activists break into a pig farm with the intention of freeing all of its caged animals. They don’t find any pigs, but they do find the sons and daughter of the farm’s owner. Nasha takes the farmer’s oldest son, Jacco, to the killing floor where she hopes to expose and humiliate him. The situation spins out of control, leaving Jacco clinging to life. When the owner of the farm arrives, he decides to deal with his uninvited guests using brutality usually reserved for the pigs he slaughters.
Meat Kills was directed by Dutch filmmaker Martijn Smits (Kill Zombie, 2012), and it was written by Johan Paul De Vrijer. The film stars Caro Derkx as Mirthe, a new recruit in Nasha’s group who doesn’t feel comfortable with their extreme ways, but is caught up in the conflict regardless. Emma Josten co-stars as Nasha, with Sem Ben Yakar, Tommy Zonneveld, and Chardonnay Rillen filling out the rest of the activist group. Bart Oomen plays the farm’s owner, Jonas. His sons are played by Derron Lurvink and Sweder De Sitter, and his daughter is played by Juliette Van De Weerdt.
Meat Kills Review
Frankly, by the way some people were talking about Meat Kills, I was expecting more gore. That’s not to say there isn’t a lot of blood. There is. A lot of blood. And some guts. But the buildup to the gore is gradual, with a few surprise bursts along the way. The first hour isn’t that bloody. So, Meat Kills won’t be the wall-to-wall bloodiest movie gorehounds have ever seen, but the buildup is what makes the gorier scenes in the movie play so effectively.
The gore might be what gets many people to watch the movie, but the characters and story shouldn’t be overlooked. The story is basic, but it creates a scenario perfect for a multi-layered conflict. On one side we have the activists. Their ideals are noble, but the movie forces us to question how far is too far when it comes to proving a point through exposure and physical retribution. Where’s the line, and would you be willing to cross it? Do the ends justify the means?
On the other side is the pig-farmer and his family. The line on their side has to do with accountability. Abusing animals is wrong, but from the owner of the farm down to his two sons and young daughter, how accountable are each of them for their actions or inactions? Ultimately the conflict increases thanks to heat-of-the-moment decisions, leading to an escalating series of violence. It’s two sides of a moral position, with each side taken to extremes when emotions and survival instincts kick in. Simple and effective from a plot standpoint, but complex from a thematic perspective.
The real hook though, is in the character work. Mirthe is caught in-between the two sides. She’s the audience’s conduit into the emotionally charged reactions of all the other characters. She supports the ideals of the activists, but she questions their methods. Mirthe opposes the farmer and his family, but she sees the humanity in the younger son, Jonathan. She’s somewhat indecisive as a character (or in other words, she’s the most rational), which leads to her playing both sides at certain points. This allows her to have a very interesting and satisfying character arc that is fulfilled when she finally takes action. But even in the end, the audience might question their loyalty to someone whose decisions really did ignite the conflict.
Meat Kills is a movie about violence leading to violence. Nobody is safe, and everyone feels its effects. Blood is spilled, guts hit the floor, and bodies are destroyed. It’s a splatter movie with a point, and it works fantastically well.
Rating and Recommendation
Star Rating: 4 out of 5
Meat Kills feels like a less-extreme version of Frontier(s) (2007) mixed with the pig-themed slasher sensibilities of Slaughterhouse (1987), along with a resolution that has a dark complexity somewhere in the vicinity of The Descent (2005). Anyone who enjoys any of those movies should give Meat Kills a watch.
Meat Kills is streaming on Screambox, or you can rent it on Prime Video.
