Fantasia 2021: BULL Review–Mesmeric, Grounded Revenge Tale
Starring Neil Maskell and David Hayman
Written by Paul Andrew Williams
Directed by Paul Andrew Williams
There’s a scene that occurs midway through Paul Andrew Williams’ Bull that emanates an irresistible kind of grungy, urban tension, the kind that seems the singular dominion of grounded, UK thrillers. David Hayman– of Trial & Retribution fame– has just offered an older woman, Bull’s mother, Marge (Elizabeth Counsell), a cup of tea. It’s ostensibly innocuous, replete with inconsequential banter, but it packs a punch.
Bull, Paul Andrew Williams’ first feature film in nine years, is an uncompromising, unflinching, and sheerly brutal piece of filmmaking. It’s packed full of small moments, not all of which are Bull’s most violent nor its most hypnotic, but they’re emblematic of what, fundamentally, makes Bull so special. Small in scale and scope, it delves into the darkest depths of broken men, their fractured psyches, and how– when they have nothing left– they’d rather watch the world burn than live with the damage they’ve done.
Neil Maskell, equally as captivating here as he was in Ben Wheatley’s 2011 cult shocker Kill List, stars as the titular Bull, a gang enforcer left for dead who, after ten years away, returns to her old turf to seek vengeance against the men who left him dead. Additionally, he is in search of his son, Aiden (Henri Charles), not heard from in the ten years since. A vicious tapestry of gritty violence and thematically rich symbolism, Bull is a revenge saga for the ages.
Part of that– a large part, in fact– is on account of just how deftly Paul Andrew Williams balances the grounded and the divine. Bull, not unlike Uma Thurman’s Bride in Kill Bill, is both a man with a storied history and a symbol, an errant train leaving destruction and death in his wake. He is where he needs to be at the right time, and little of Bull follows just how, exactly, he finds the people he needs to. He simply does, save for one particular target, and he’s always adroit at both defending himself and exacting his vengeance.
It helps that the setting looks so great, combining hazy visages of English streets with neon-lit, sensorily divine forays into boardwalk carnivals and burning trailers. Bull, too, makes no amends about just how vicious Bull is, with several deaths liable to make even the most steadfast of audience members wince and recoil. It is assuaged some by Bull’s preternatural, paternal mission– he is, after all, in search of his son– but he’s in an old haunting, tracking down old collaborators. Beyond how personal his mission is, Bull is no less forgiving than his enemies.
Where Bull falters some is in its exploration of Bull and Aiden’s relationship. These vignettes of summer barbecues and fishing trips, while sweet, do little but add broad father/son brushstrokes to Bull’s impetus. He’s an almost canonically good dad, always patient, a man whose memories of his son are refracted through soft lighting and almost supernatural merriment. Neil Maskell sells these moments well– though Bull could have done more with his appearance to distinguish the dueling timelines– and on account of his performance, he might make you well up as often as he bashes a kneecap in or severs a throat.
Bull is a movie of juxtaposition and a damned good one at that. It’s a riveting, tense, and mesmeric revenge saga. The violence is motivated, the characterization raw, and it’s rooted in both a profoundly good performance from Neil Maskell and a worthwhile return to the director’s chair for Paul Andrew Williams. With the iconography, drive, and gore of horror, Bull is a genre feature with considerable crossover appeal.
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Bull
Summary
Bull is hypnotic, violent, and cathartic. A gritty revenge tale, it’s elevated by personality, restraint, and a mesmeric performance from star Neil Maskell.
