Severance
It’s been a long and tiring road for the sales team of Palisade Defence, touring European cities to tout the latest in “anti-personnel weaponry you can rely on,” their coach now on its way to the luxury lodge recently acquired by the company for a weekend of relaxation and team building in the mountains of Hungary, director George awaiting their arrival with the food and Steve arranging other diversions, booking escorts and carrying various recreational herbal supplements.
A fallen tree blocking their progress, manager Richard takes charge and insists they continue on foot, determining that rest is not far, but what they find is an abandoned building, Maggie uneasy, Jill convinced they’re being watched and Billy keeping his head down while Gordon makes the best of things, cooking a pie he finds in the fridge which contains a human tooth, and Harris discovers a cache of documents indicating this was an “asylum” which housed war criminals.
The ghosts of the past and the sins of the present catching up with the representatives of the company who only sell the weapons, they don’t use them, from landmines to anti-aircraft missiles, Severance is directed by Consecration’s Christoper Smith from a script co-written with Blood Shed’s James Moran, starring Laura Harris, Claudie Blakley, Toby Stephens, Andy Nyman, Babou Ceesay, Tim McInnerny and Danny Dyer as the corporate cannon fodder dodging bullets and responsibility.
Richard having ascended to his position through sucking his way up the chain rather than any semblance of competence, he is ill-equipped to handle a crisis with anything other than buzzwords and the conviction that his decisions should not be questioned, while Steve spends the film high as a kite and diligent Gordon ends up legless, the “well-trained savages” hiding in the forest as anonymous as the agents of Palisade have been to those maimed in wars they have supplied.
The team composed of people who distance themselves from the repercussions of their work now confronted with the brutal reality of it, Severance is a film of many parts and shifting styles with digressions into silent movie, documentary and the surreal, hilarious and horrifying, irreverent and unexpectedly heartfelt, a satirical black comedy horror which leaves the ever-relevant questions of complicity hanging, sometimes upside down in trees, yet still somehow manages to justify a final scene of a busty Hungarian escort resonating in harmony as she fires a machine gun.
Restored in 4K, the new edition of Severance contains new and archive features including a cast and crew commentary which confirms that the bear was real, interviews with Smith and Nyman, featurettes, behind the scenes footage, multiple deleted scenes including a drugged-up Steve encountering a talking deer voiced by the great Leslie Phillips, and outtakes, the UHD release also carrying a poster and art cards.
Severance will be available on digital download from Monday 6th October and on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD from Monday 20th October
