Nerds That Geek Movie Review – ‘3: An Eye for an Eye’

Written by John Edward Betancourt 

When one takes a moment to ponder upon the horror genre, and all the wonder that it offers, we instantly think of all the elements that helped us to fall in love with the genre. For some of us, it was a powerful scare that sucked us in. For others, disturbing moments or buckets of gore served as the grand draw, but the bottom line is that horror knows how to tug at us on a primal level and I suppose if there is any complaint or criticism that needs to be offered up when it comes to modern horror, is that the genre has shifted away from some of those all-important emotional elements.
 
It’s about style over substance for some horror stories these days, and while it is supremely cool to see the genre everywhere since it dominates television and remains a draw at the box office, sometimes I find myself longing for the days when horror tugged at your mind in disturbing fashion. You know what I’m talking about, those kinds of films that leave you unsettled as you watch them, to the point where you wonder if you should even continue since the story is going to such supremely dark places. However, while those types of stories are a difficult find on T.V. or at the box office, they still exist by way of the independent horror market and recently, I had the opportunity to watch a horror film that is happy to dig into the darker parts of the genre in 3: An Eye for an Eye.
 
Now in this particular tale, we are introduced to a man and woman whose names we never learn, we only know that they are on a mission, to bring peace to the woman’s soul. For the woman, was brutally raped a year ago, and the man believes he has come to learn the identity of her assailant and is going to help her bring her assaulter to justice by torturing a confession out of the man and well, the less I say about the plot the better, because the twists and turns that await you in this film are best experienced rather than dictated to you, dear reader. But that doesn’t mean we are done with this review just yet, because there is a lot of spoiler free stuff to discuss when it comes to this motion picture. 

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​Case in point, the fact that this really is a brutal horror film, the kind that holds nothing back, and much of that is driven by the man and the woman and their plan to obtain a sense of justice and their decision to exact revenge leaves the audience conflicted. Because on one hand, revenge against a rapist doesn’t exactly sound like a terrible thing, but since we don’t quite know up front whether or not the captured man in question actually committed this terrible crime, the awful things that happen to him push our sense of justice to the limit and leave you squirming in your seat.
 
Yet, while it seems as though at first, this movie is going to fall into a Hostel-esque trap visually, and provide the audience with an hour and a half of pure ‘torture porn’, the breaks in between the ugly are where this horror film shines because it does take the time to allow for the audience to get to know the man and woman in question and the trauma they’ve both gone through and really, this exploration of their motivations and what makes them tick makes them incredibly tragic characters through and through. Because it truly allows for us to understand just how broken they really are and truly, one would have to be shattered to the point of no return to seek out this particular brand of justice.
 
However, what makes this film so incredibly fascinating and worth your time is the mystery revolving around whether or not their victim is indeed the man who committed this horrendous crime and the unraveling of that particular conundrum, leads to some incredible twists and turns as the story rolls on, which means that in the end, this is a horror film that I absolutely recommend. Because this one, really is a twisted and bleak ride, one that genuinely left me uncomfortable, and if by chance you’re okay with the subject matter and want to learn more about the surprises in question in this film, give it a look, since it offers up some unique ideas and some genuinely unsettling moments.   ​

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