(note: A more detailed account of the film can be found in this week's BOOS! And WHOOP-DOOS! column.)

Donkey Punch is yet another great cinematic endeavor that owes its righteous path to the latest horror sub-genre trend, which marries neo-realism to an 80s slasher aesthetic. It starts out as a party, and ends in realistic pools of unprecedented gore. It’s a near perfect, eye-opening look at our current youth culture, which heavily relies upon youtube instant satisfaction and self-aggrandizing. Like it or not, we live in an era where every small event, such as going to the beach or taking the dog for a walk, is reason enough to pull out our camera and take a picture for Facebook. We are fictionalizing our own myths out of mundane minutia. And Donkey Punch is a product of that environment.

Ollie Blackburn's film is the crowning jewel in this new era of true horror, and it follows directly in the pragmatic wake of other films of its kind. Such as Hostel and The Ruins. It rises above their intended scare-house tactics by completely sucking any fantastical elements out of its premise. This is an exacting look at our current spring break culture, which is inhabited by imagination deficient pleasure seekers immune to the shared cruelty of their own outsized egos. They have been weaned on and saturated by one viral snuff image after the next. And they have lost all site of their own morals to become these surely beasts of nature. They do only that which benefits their own out of whack sense of self.

What happens in Donkey Punch could be happening as we speak. The actions and reactions of its doomed set of ageless Peter Pan misfits is as real as anything else going on in the world. They hobble along using drugs and sex as their crutch. Never once considering the repercussions of their next move. Masterpiece is a word that gets thrown around a lot these days, and it almost does a disservice to the film in question. Donkey Punch isn’t so much a masterpiece as it is a keen observation into the youth culture that is attempting to overrun this country. It’s a scary mental note. No one can be trusted.

The title alone should clue you into its themes of perverse flippancy. Sex is a tool used to fuel the pleasure barge. The term is a gateway into absurdist objectivity. Nothing is scared, and no act is too cruel or unusual. The Donkey Punch has become a playground adjective. An elementary level punch line that does little too shock or scare the most timid of Sunday school students. If Fat Albert were alive today, he’d probably get away with shouting its uniqueness across that old Saturday morning junkyard of his. It’s the equivalent of a fart joke. And it rests alongside those other colorful terms such as The Dirty Sanchez, the Cleveland Steamer, and the Pink Sock. If you don’t know what a Donkey Punch is, I won’t ruin it for you. The action causes a cruel chain reaction, and the entire second half of the film’s narrative is hinged to this brutal concept.

The cast is made up of mostly unknowns. For what its worth, they could be playing themselves, and we’d never know they difference. They are all quite good at convincing us this is real. It’s inches away from being a documentary. And even though they hail from Great Brittan, you probably know at least one of the seven main characters in your own life. The two standouts are Jaime Winstone (as Kim) and Tom Burke (as Bluey), simply because they have strong, attractive, magnetic screen personalities. And they are the intended bad seeds of each gender quadrant, allowing us to see that neither side is innocent. Look deep into their dark eyes, and you may even realize that both are the smartest of the bunch.

This high praise isn’t meant to slam the other performers in the piece. Nichola Burley (as Tammi) and Julian Morris (as Josh) both bring strong, weighty performances to this rocking boat. These two remain quite understated through a great deal of what transpires over the course of an hour and forty minutes. They are the meekest. And they are the one’s that certainly surprise us the most. Watching the film a second and third time, it’s Nichola and Julian whose quaint stature resonates throughout the core message of the film.

Not to give anything away, but the cusp of the story rests on Nichola Burley’s shoulders. Her Tammi sets everything in motion, and it’s her ultimate pronouncement that eventually gets the worst of everybody. There comes a moment, late in the film, where Kim yells at her, “This is all your fault!” And I thought, perfect. Director/co-writer Ollie Blackburn is thinking exactly what I am thinking. It is Tammi’s fault. If she hadn’t been so broken up about her failed relationship, these girls would have never been in this situation to begin with. Sadly, those aren’t the words that come out of Kim’s mouth. But it is true. None of these characters would be where they end up if it hadn’t been for one girl’s teary-eyed quest to forget her disposable boyfriend. The cheater is nonexistent in the film, and he is used as an anchor for pushing the threads of this thin plot to unimaginable, yet very sincere levels. Kim and her blonde neophyte partner in crime Lisa (Sian Breckin, who doesn’t stand a chance from the get go) take it upon themselves to shake Tammi out of her funk. Vacationing in the Mediterranean, these three girls leave their hotel to go bar hopping in the middle of the afternoon. The opening moments will certainly remind you of The Ruins. The trio meets up with a couple of handsome twenty-something yacht deckhands, they steal a bottle of cheap champagne, and get to know each other while sipping it on the beach. After a few flirtatious looks, they all decide to move the party onto a nearby boat. And the moments are photographed as though a film student proficient in narrow cinematography had been asked to capture his older sister’s wake.

Donkey Punch is about making all the wrong decisions and the loss of personal morality. It is like a magnifying glass help up close and cued into our latest generation’s own self obsessive ways of behaving. Especially in the face of real tragedy. Life is treated with disdain, and nothing but self preservation is sacred. To say more than “shit gets fucked up on this boat” would be to spoil the tender surprises that await the viewer. It is a cavalcade of poorly thought out moments that topple on top of each other in a precisely fated manor. And the really messed up part about the whole thing is, it could be happening right now. As we speak. Somewhere, out there in the world. And we would never even hear about it, unless one of those involved had publicly known parents. It’s a shame that this is what the world is coming to. Yet it is so fascinating on a visceral level.

To enjoy Donkey Punch is to understand its ramifications and place within this rising new neo-realism horror genre. It is being released as film number four in Magnet’s Six-Shooter series. And like the previous three entries, which include Let the Right One In, Special, and Timecrimes, it is certainly one of the best genre offerings opening in the United States this year (it was released July 18th of 2008 in the UK). And it pushes its own particular sub-genre of horror to innovative, unobtainable heights.

Donkey Punch? Whoop-doo!

(All of B. Alan Orange’s reviews are based on the Boo! or Whoop-doo! evaluation system.)