Review: What the Waters Left Behind

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

What the Waters Left Behind (aka Los Olivados)

Directed by Luciano Onetti and Nicolàs Onetti

Cine Argentino; Instituto Nacional de Cine Y Arts Audiovisuales;
Onetti Brothers Productions; Black Mandala Films;
Rusty Robot; Unearthed Films; MVD Entertainment

100 minutes, 2017 / 2020

https://www.masterpiecesthemovie.com/

www.unearthedfilms.net

www.mvdentertainment.com

In remote Argentina, there was a popular tourist town called Villa Epecuén, just off Laguna Especuén, which has a high salt content like the Dead Sea; it was thus touted as a health resort. In 1985, a dam busted and the town was flooded out. When the waters receded a bit in the mid-2000, what was left were ruins that were white, coated with salt. It was uninhabitable (though a singular elderly person actually still lives in the very real place).

Epecuén is the focal point of the imagined story, as a film crew of seven decides to go gech it out and make a documentary of the place. If anyone follows stories like this, from the fantastical Creepozoids (1987) to the more recent The Chernobyl Diaries (2012), you know there is no good that is going to come from this exercise, such as for our gaggle of genre gauchos.

In part of the prologue, we actually get to see some nice aerial drone images of, well, what the waters let behind of the original town, followed by a brief but bloody confrontation. Did I mention this film is distributed by Stephen “American Guinea Pig” Biro’s imprint, Unearthed Films, so you know there is going to be a bloodbath involved; if that’s your thing, keep reading.

This could quite easily have been just one more Found Footage style release, considering our troupe is making a documentary, but thankfully the Onetti brothers decided to make a narrative film, with a few through-camera-style shots here and there.

Agustin Pardella, Victoria Maurette, Paula Brasca, Luciano Onetti,
Victorio D 'Alessandro, Paula Sartor, and Damián Dreizik  

We get to learn a little about the group on the road trip to the site in an old-style VW Van, such as Nacho (Victorio D 'Alessandro), the boom buy and driver being a frat boy type, the director Vasco (Damián Dreizik), who amusingly is wearing a Francesca tee-shirt, giving a nod to the Onetti Brothers' previous 2015 film; reviewed HERE)  is a surly older guy, model-esque Vicky (Paula Sartor) is his sexy and too-young-for-him girlfriend (and her small poodle, Kiki), the camera woman Erica (Paula Brasca, wearing a blue Ramones tee), the AD Diego (Augustin Pardella), and Carla (Victoria Maurette), who is a survivor of the initial flood when she was just a wee one. She gives them (i.e., us) a bit of personal exposition to where we are bound. Then there is the mysterious Señor X (Gustavo Garzón), who appears with a rifle; is he one of the good guys or in with the evil clan? Historically, in other films of this nature, this typical genre character can go either way. Oh, do I need to say that the film is in Spanish, with English subtitles?  Oh, wait... too late.

What I found impressive is that the location is actually at Epecuén, so we get to see quite a bit of the town, or what is left of it. Fascinating stuff. Speaking of which, in the first act we get to see some very nice Latina and Latino bods, flexing their youth such as in a bikini and shirtless. To paraphrase the Killer, Jerry Lee Lewis, Come-along a-baby, there's a whole lot of sexual tension goin' on... including one I did not see coming. The cigarettes are not the only thing that's smokin'. 

Rather than a leather face, the native miscreants seem to lean more towards the type of masks worn in The Road Warrior (1981; aka Mad Max 2). Cattle skulls appear to be the màscara du jour. With the slightly washed out and desolate local images, this could almost be seen as a post-apocalyptic world (because in this locus, it is).

While the story really picks up around the half-way point, the Onetti Bros manage to keep things hopping along the way, between the tension with some locals, the visuals, and the characters, so there is little time to be restless even though the ultra-violence is mostly in the second half. If this were the 1970s, the Ramones could come and save the day like that ridiculous KISS movie from 1978, but this was filmed in the late 2010s, and it was too late for the Ramones (RIP) and many of the film’s characters by then.

Yeah, the film is brutal, but there are two ways to look at it. For the average viewer who is used to “CSI” level of gore, this is quite shocking. For fans of films like the Hostel (2005) series and later versions of the Saw (2004) franchise, this is enjoyable and comparable, but not as a gore-fest as some of the other torture porn styles that Unearthed usually distributes (though I am saying this is still right up their alley) along the level of the likes of Audition (1999) or Bouquet of Guts and Gore (2014: reviewed HERE). 

That being said, sometimes the way the film cuts away just when something is about to happen, I wonder if there is a different edit of the film floating around somewhere that doesn’t occasionally (not always) skirts the issue for which most of the gorehounds are sniffin’ around. But don’t be deterred, there are still lots and lots of brutally violent and blood-soaked body parts to be seen and tasted.

Of course, the big, $64,000 question, is by the end will it be a mass slaughter of the innocents, or will there be a comeuppance; perhaps a mixture of both? I ain’t tellin’ since that’s a major part of the fun of these kinds of things.

Even from the trailer, it’s easy to see some of the foundations the filmmakers dipped their own toes into, such as the mini-van along the dusty road of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), or the hungry, hungry hippo actions of the towns inhabitants, like The Hills Have Eyes (1977; note that for both of these sources, I refer to the originals). And let’s not forget the utter bleakness and frenzy of Wolf Creek (2005) and the Wrong Turn (2003- ) franchise. If you want to push it, you could even add in Mrs. Lovett’s meat pies of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (for this, I refer to the original play, not the limp film version). One character could even be straight out of Mother’s Day (1980), though I don’t know if she’s “a very a sick woman” physically, but mentally is another story.

What made me smile is that even though I figured out a key plot point early on, the way it was presented (meaning the timing) took me by surprise. This was an excellent choice by the Onettis. That is why, despite all its reliance on earlier and classic canon, the film still works and can keep the viewer entertained.

And stick around for the credits and afterwards for some amazing real news footage of the flood from, I'm guessing, the 1990s.