The Dead Lands (2014) poster
2014 · adventure · action · revenge · music

The Dead Lands

Directed by Toa Fraser1h 48m2014
ElsewhereIMDb6.35kRT68%Metacritic59
  • sombre
  • brisk
  • extreme
  • cold
Movie DNA

Sombre, kinetic, extreme adventure / action, grounded in texture. Ambivalent, mid-stakes, cold, hand-scored across twelve axes of taste.

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Hongi, a Maori chieftain’s teenage son, must avenge his father’s murder in order to bring peace and honour to the souls of his loved ones after his tribe is slaughtered through an act of treachery. Vastly outnumbered by a band of villains led by Wirepa, Hongi’s only hope is to pass through the feared and forbidden “Dead Lands” and forge an uneasy alliance with a mysterious warrior, a ruthless fighter who has ruled the area for years.

Our read · The Dead Lands (2014) reads as a sombre, kinetic, grounded adventure · action · revenge entry — extreme in intensity, mid-stakes in scope, cold in temperature, ambivalent in outlook. Hand-scored on twelve axes of taste — mood, pacing, weirdness, hope, stakes, humour, reality, density, warmth, auteur, intensity, and era — with a derived palette drawn from its dominant cinematography.

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The shape of The Dead Lands

Tonight, this looks like

What watching it is actually like.

You want raw, violent Maori revenge action set in a brutal pre-colonial world.

ends bittersweetit leaves you shakensteady all the waygrips by minute 12attention 4/5earns its lengthsubtitles: full
Date nightWith friendsSoloWith parentsKids around
Heads-upgraphic violencegore

Skip it tonightSkip if nonstop tribal warfare and bloody revenge quests will leave you wrecked tonight.

DNA · twelve axes

The reading.

Each axis is hand-scored — not derived from votes or genre averages. The marker shows where this film sits; the gradient fill uses the film's own cinematography palette.

Mood · HeavyCosy
Pacing · Slow-burnKinetic
Intensity · GentleExtreme
Weirdness · ConventionalSurreal
Hope · NihilisticRedemptive
Stakes · IntimateEpic
Humour · NoneBroad
Reality · GroundedFantastical
Density · SparseTwisty
Warmth · ColdTender
Auteur · TransparentSignature
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