Moritz Mohr’s “Boy Kills World” is a tedious dystopian revenge action flick that could have been brisk fun had it not relied on an unnecessarily bloated structure rife with flashbacks and sudden revelations. What should have been a lean action film is so overstretched over a needlessly protracted runtime that all the joy leaks out. This is no smart, snappy film but one that is tiringly over-underlined, where every emotion and note of the protagonist’s predicament is dutifully spelled out.
The film feels more labored than fresh, manufactured in its rhythms than springing and leaping with abandon and playfulness. It is a film that pummels the viewer into exhaustion. The weight of the back-and-forth heaves on the viewer to such a degree we struggle to emotionally connect with the frantic action. Instead of zippy energy, the film is curiously deflating and flat, an uninspired mishmash of a tonne of unconvincing sequences filled with one-dimensional characters and patently ludicrous dialogues. It doesn’t help that there’s a constant voiceover that can genuinely get on anyone’s nerves. I am not sure why the makers thought of it as a good idea in the first place.
“Boy Kills World” is an excruciating misfire on every count conceivable. Mohr has made something that’s lazy, purposelessly chaotic, and senselessly dull despite the wildly exaggerated plotting. The problem with the film is it fusses extravagantly about crafting a coherent world when it entirely forgets the cardinal rules of persuasively erecting it in the first place. The very base of the film is shaky, so it is practically unsalvageable as the hero plunges through eminently forgettable situations and hurtles towards a discovery whose shock value comes off as wholly muted and tepid.
Boy Kills World (2024) Movie Summary & Plot Synopsis:
How Did Boy Lose His Family?
The film opens in a dystopian totalitarian kingdom ruled by the dynasty of the Van Der Koys. It is a regime of terror and oppression. Dissidents who dared to protest against the brutal injustices are immediately hunted out and murdered. The dynasty endorses a rule of absolute autocracy, where violence is meted out to the slightest of opponents to their policies and diktats. Nobody is spared, not even children. The film’s protagonist who is simply called Boy (Bill Skasgard) is the victim of the terror that has plucked out his whole family.
There is the Culling, an annual ceremony where twelve rebels are taken out before an audience. It is set up as a spectacular event, designed to elaborately demonstrate what is the ultimate fate for all signs of resistance. As a kid, Boy had seen his mother and sister being shot right in front of him. A shaman (Yayan Ruhian) had swooped in, rescued him, and gave him shelter. The shaman, who was his mother’s friend, acquainted him with the tragedy as well as tutored him in the art of being a ruthless warrior. His purpose is to kill Hilda (Famke Janssen).
How Far Will Boy Go to Destroy the Van Der Koys?
The only memory he has of his past is the loving times he shared with his sister, Mina. He is raring for revenge, but the shaman keeps deferring him, telling him he isn’t ready yet. When there is a massacre at the marketplace, Boy is triggered, and he decides he must embark on his plan of exacting vengeance. He rolls into the trunk of Gideon’s, Hilda’s brother’s car, and follows Glen, Hilda’s brother-in-law. There is also an enforcer, June24 (Jessica Rothe), who is particularly ruthless in carrying out orders assigned to her.
The ghost of Mina tags along, distracting him and resulting in his cover being blown to Glen. He takes down an army of guards and frees Basho, who was held captive. Together, they form a team, along with Benny, another member of the Resistance. A convoluted series of circumstances results, with Boy murdering Glen at a staged ceremony where Boy had thought he’d assassinate Hilda. Gideon, who apprehended and pre-empted such a situation, takes Boy into custody. June27 demands of the Boy to apprise her of the whereabouts of the shaman. But he refuses to divulge any details.
Gideon frees Boy, telling him he, too, looked forward to Hilda’s downfall, nudging him to wreak chaos on live television. At the televised Culling, Melanie (Michelle Dockery), Hilda’s sister who had orchestrated the entire ceremony, is cast into deep shock and surprise when Hilda, prone to the streak of paranoia, makes a speech that slides into unexpected directions. Hilda is distraught and anguished but Melanie is upset her best-laid plans are being thrown awry. A shootout ensues, which culminates in the Boy killing Melanie and Gideon and marching to the bunker, where Hilda spends most of her time.
Boy Kills World (2024) Movie Ending Explained:
Does the Boy succeed in taking revenge?
It is while waiting for Hilda the film springs its biggest revelation. The Boy is a member of the family and actually the son of Hilda. A family portrait reveals it all. An emotional Hilda informs him of the truth. She tells him how the shaman had effectively manipulated the Boy into his streak of vengeance. Practically everything the Boy held and imagined as his past was a narrative fed to him meticulously by the shaman, who projected his own vendetta through him, turning the Boy against his own family. It had been the Boy who pulled the trigger and shot down all of the shaman’s family, goaded by Hilda. When he was asked to shoot for a final time, he couldn’t endure it any further and escaped.
The shaman had later found him and taken him into his manipulative care. The Boy was blinded to the plan of retribution, which was the shaman’s ultimate agenda. When Hilda realizes he has no affection for her, she orders June, who is Mina, to kill him. But Mina is overcome with emotion for her brother and kills Hilda instead. As they try to escape, the shaman arrives. In a fight, the Boy manages to kill the shaman. The brother-sister duo attempts to flee from the totalitarian hellhole. Things may be risky but they have each other.
