The Domestics
- Lexi
- Jul 4, 2018
- 2 min read
The Domestics (2018)
Director: Mike P. Nelson
Cast: Kate Bosworth, Tyler Hoechlin, Lance Reddick, Sonya Mizuno
In a terrifying post-apocalyptic world inhabited by murderous gangs divided into deadly factions, Nina and Mark race desperately across the lawless countryside in search of safety. As one depraved group narrows their search for the couple, they must work together as they are pushed to the breaking point to survive.
The Domestics, aka Mad Max of the Midwest. It's a story of kill or be killed, in a post apocalyptic world where everything is ruled by bloodthirsty and depraved gangs. A couple are making their way through the boonies of Wisconsin to Milwaukee by way of side streets. A 5 hour drive is turned into 3+ days because all of the highways are riddled with snipers and looters. Nina (Kate Bosworth) and her husband, Mark (Tyler Hoechlin), were getting a divorce before the end of the world, it's now been at least 902 days since and they've decided to stay together and go be with Nina's parents. The make allies and enemies along the way, eventually learning how to 'play the part' and survive this deadly wasteland.
There are elements of humor in this, but most of the fun comes from the design and the absurdity of the situations they get into. The acting is a bit all over the place, some people were larger than life, while some were stiff. Bosworth gives a good performance while her counterpart Hoechlin seems like he's just delivering lines and at about half volume. But at the end of the day you're not watching this movie for the acting. This is a George Miller world with gangs who wear animal carcasses as masks, homicidal pinup girls and machine gun toting muscle cars.
But before you start praying to your V8 gods and painting yourself chrome, this isn't actually an American rip-off of Mad Max. It distances itself by never really having a car chase, just features some of their bad ass rides. There's 100 different things going on in this movie but besides for the occasional souped up snowplows there's not much vehicular manslaughter happening, it's all death by firearms or explosions.
The soundtrack is mostly oldies played by Crazy Al, a radio dj who updates you with news from around the state and provides some of the exposition throughout. His role is very reminiscent of the jockey from Fallout 4.
Side note: I think they really missed out on not using Static X's Wisconsin Death Trip as their soundtrack.
All in all I really dug this movie, I thought it was fun and well shot and impeccably designed. It's definitely one of the better modern b-horror movie I've seen in a while and if you like trigger-happy, post-apocalyptic mayhem then you should check this out.
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