Aussie Horror Movie: Primal, Brings Fear into the Outback

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Primal (2010)
The 2010 Australian fictional horror Primal brings fear of the outback to whole new level and will definitely eat a new respect for nature into horror lovers.

Set in the pristine outback of Australia, Primal is about six university students on an anthropological expedition to explore 200 year old rock paintings. However, their trip turns into a nightmare when they fall ill to a mysterious disease that brings out their most primitive and primal instincts.

The film stars Zoe Tuckwell-Smith (Anja), Krew Boylan (Mel), Linsay Ferris (Chad), Rebekah Foord (Kris), Damien Freeleagus (Warren) and Will Traval (Dace), directed by Josh Reed and is written by Nigel Christensen and Reed.

Primal is a hybrid between werewolves and zombies, but has a more organic grounding that makes it believably scary.

In the film, slutty Mel goes skinny dipping in the lake near the friends’ camp and becomes the target for bloodsucking leeches. Soon she becomes feverish and sick - and begins to regress into a vicious blood thirsty creature.

For me, the film is about personal transformation and inhibited characteristics that find their way to the surface.

Mel, the first to be infected, is literally a man eater and is not ashamed of her body which she gives us a gratuitous viewing in the skinny dipping scene. Dace, who is always in control, loses it but the most interesting change occurs in Anja who literally has to overcome her phobias in order to survive.

Veteran gore-mongers and horror fans will have already seen this level of blood and guts before. However, for an Australian film of this genre, it sticks out like a sore thumb, in a gory sort of way, and will have you thinking twice about skinny dipping (or camping) in the Australian wilderness.

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