Compulsion (Elegant Angel) Review

Reviewed by andyblake  on  3/28/2005

This is probably the most ambitious feature film that Elegant Angel has ever attempted. Axel Braun and Patrick Collins really went all out with this film, and it is a marked departure from Elegant Angel's normal product. To begin with, the budget was alot more than they usually spend, and most of it is on the screen in the form of locations, cars, and excellent audio and video. There's even a song that Axel Braun wrote specifically for the feature, and Belladonna does a pretty decent job singing it.

The plot is a love triangle between an older mobster, played by Patrick Collins, the mobster's son, played by Kurt Lockwood, and the mobster's much younger trophy wife, played by Ashley Long who is apparently from Australia. The father wants the son to go to law school, not to follow in his footsteps by becoming a mobster. The son is too much of a chip off the old block to go that way. Instead, he opens up a club in Europe, but gets crossways with one of his partners. The bad partner, played by an English actor, murders a girl and frames Lockwood for the murder. Lockwood then flies back to the U.S. and, for the first time, meets his dad's young wife. Immediately, there is chemistry between them and you know exactly where this plot is going. I was blown away by Patrick Collins' acting performance; he was outstanding and totally believable in the role. He could act in mainstream, if this is any indication.

I respect the effort that went into all aspects of this film, but I am troubled by the extreme misogyny on display throughout. Two of the female characters are murdered, and the final group scene between a caged Ashley Long and three guys was extremely rough. It was basically a simulated gang rape. I am not usually bothered by rough sex, if the girl is into it, but I found this scene troublingly misogynistic, un-erotic, and generally a huge turn off. I wonder how a guy like Axel Braun really feels about women, and whether he should be in a business that should be about glamorizing and adoring women, not about degrading and destroying them.