In Primal, Josh Reed shows us how brutal and forceful our basic roots can be, literally.
The story plays out in the outback of Australia, where Anja (Zoe Tuckwell-Smith) and her friends have followed the young anthropology student, Dace (Wil Traval), in his search for a legendary 12,000 years old rock painting.
The reason for its fame is that no one has seen it, besides a pioneer who wrote about it in his diary, shortly before he slaughtered his family, in a state of complete madness.
The group gets very excited as they do find the painting, but it all turns to the worse, as Mel (Krew Boylan), gets feverish after a bit of skinny dipping, in a pool of stagnant water, near the painting.
She rapidly becomes sicker and her body and mind start to regress into a primal and predatory state, and it doesn’t take long before she viciously starts to attack her former friends.
The previously enthusiastic group must suddenly fight for their survival, a fight that brings them face to face with an ancient evil, dwelling deep within the mountain.
The setup and the plot reminded me a bit about another good movie, The Ruins, with one big difference. In The Ruins, the horror where presented in a somewhat hidden fashion, opposed to Primal, which cruelly throws it into our faces, in a more hardcore fashion, complete with stop-motion and bloody jagged teeth, which is something that I really enjoy!
However, no distributor has decided to take Primal, under their wings yet, but I hope that will change, if the movie just gets some buzz. I have a gut feeling that it will give us a rather awesome experience, if we can enjoy it on a big screen, opposed to small ones in our homes.
What do you think does Primal appeal to your basic blood thirsty instincts?