Taking its cue from Boorman's Deliverance, Rituals features a group of middle-aged city doctors heading off for a yearly holiday, this time a hiking trip in the Canadian wilderness. They are systematically terrorised, tortured and killed by a disfigured redneck. As (bad) luck would have it, this one has an axe to grind with the medical profession. So, they really picked the wrong craphole in the middle of nowhere to tramp through.
Visually, this looks like your typically grainy, low budget seventies exploitation flick. What sets it apart is the quality of the writing, the performances by real actors with some pedigree to recommend them and a lack of gratuitous on screen violence. The damage inflicted to human flesh and bone is not sensationalised nor lingered upon, rather the effects and outcomes of that damage becomes the focus and defines how the story arc is affected.
Rituals starts out sedately enough, and slowly cranks up the tension, as the good natured banter and leg-pulling between the "friends" (some of which is quite witty and amusing) quickly spirals into accusatory bile and recrimination as events spiral out of their control. Hal Holbrook gives a fine performance as Harry, the most moral and principled member of the group, nicely counterbalanced by Lawrence Danes' Mitzi, a cynical, self-serving and duplicitous flip-side. This gives some indication early on of who stands the best chance of survival at the end of the day.
The location scenery shots are carefully rendered and provide that faint and haunting sense of "being there." The events, as the protagonists attempt to escape, are suitably gruelling and the final confrontation is escalated nicely to a satisfying climax that avoids the usual clichéd frills, shock double endings, killers who aren't really dead, and the like. The closing image of Holbrook sat in the middle of a deserted, barren highway as the sun slowly rises in a slow burn of muted golden shades lingers longest in the memory.
It is pleasing to see the profile of this unassuming "lost" genre piece now being deservedly raised in a re-mastered release on DVD. Fans of Deliverance, its eerie imagery and unnerving ambiance, could do far worse than give this a spin. Hardcore slasher jockeys will most likely be disappointed by the lack of blood, guts, gore and naked teen breasts.
By today's standards, Rituals is a very tame beast indeed that hasn't really maintained much power to shock the system. It does, however, engage as a fairly gripping story of human endurance in an alien environment and a depiction of civilised man's inhumanity to man. I wouldn't call it essential viewing, but it's certainly worth a look. Especially as the grotesque Stadtler and Waldorf of film critique, Siskel and Ebert, apparently didn't rate it. To me that's usually a sign of some quality, worth and meaning.
Visually, this looks like your typically grainy, low budget seventies exploitation flick. What sets it apart is the quality of the writing, the performances by real actors with some pedigree to recommend them and a lack of gratuitous on screen violence. The damage inflicted to human flesh and bone is not sensationalised nor lingered upon, rather the effects and outcomes of that damage becomes the focus and defines how the story arc is affected.
Rituals starts out sedately enough, and slowly cranks up the tension, as the good natured banter and leg-pulling between the "friends" (some of which is quite witty and amusing) quickly spirals into accusatory bile and recrimination as events spiral out of their control. Hal Holbrook gives a fine performance as Harry, the most moral and principled member of the group, nicely counterbalanced by Lawrence Danes' Mitzi, a cynical, self-serving and duplicitous flip-side. This gives some indication early on of who stands the best chance of survival at the end of the day.
The location scenery shots are carefully rendered and provide that faint and haunting sense of "being there." The events, as the protagonists attempt to escape, are suitably gruelling and the final confrontation is escalated nicely to a satisfying climax that avoids the usual clichéd frills, shock double endings, killers who aren't really dead, and the like. The closing image of Holbrook sat in the middle of a deserted, barren highway as the sun slowly rises in a slow burn of muted golden shades lingers longest in the memory.
It is pleasing to see the profile of this unassuming "lost" genre piece now being deservedly raised in a re-mastered release on DVD. Fans of Deliverance, its eerie imagery and unnerving ambiance, could do far worse than give this a spin. Hardcore slasher jockeys will most likely be disappointed by the lack of blood, guts, gore and naked teen breasts.
By today's standards, Rituals is a very tame beast indeed that hasn't really maintained much power to shock the system. It does, however, engage as a fairly gripping story of human endurance in an alien environment and a depiction of civilised man's inhumanity to man. I wouldn't call it essential viewing, but it's certainly worth a look. Especially as the grotesque Stadtler and Waldorf of film critique, Siskel and Ebert, apparently didn't rate it. To me that's usually a sign of some quality, worth and meaning.