Five guys on a forest jaunt and an unseen shooter: that about sums up this no-frills German Netflixer from 2021. Minimalistic wilderness thrillers are usually always fun, as proven by classics like DELIVERANCE, RITUALS and SOUTHERN COMFORT. PREY isn’t in the same league, ranking amid lesser entries like OPEN SEASON (1974) and SHOOT (1976). It’s not deserving, in my view, of the insultingly low 4.2 rating it currently has on the imdb, but in all frankness just isn’t very good.
Featured are Roman (who wears a tan jacket), Vincent (a brown vest), Peter (green jacket), Stefan (grey shirt) and Albert (blue jacket), businessmen friends on a wilderness outing. A few hours into their trip several gunshots ring out, one of them hitting Vincent in the left arm. The guys initially believe the bullets are errant shots from a hunter, but as more of them ring out, one of which deflates the tires of their car (the shooter evidently has unlimited ammunition), the truth becomes evident: the men are being deliberately targeted by an unseen someone.
The stripped-down approach taken by director Thomas Sieben has the effect of honing the suspense and the violence, which like the film overall is harsh, fast and unapologetic.
On a mad dash through the trees, to which the guys are keeping for cover, a woman is seen standing by a lake. Figuring the guys may have found an ally, Stefan runs up to the woman…
I’ll halt my plot summary there, at around the thirty minute point, as one’s enjoyment of the remainder of the film is contingent upon its plot developments. Those developments are telegraphed by the fact that the protagonists spend a lot of time discussing their past misdeeds, with flashbacks (and an errant video seen playing in a remote cabin) provided to illustrate their recountings—which increasingly dominate the remainder of the film.
Minimalism is PREY’S major asset, and also its biggest drawback. The stripped-down approach taken by director Thomas Sieben has the effect of honing the suspense and the violence, which like the film overall is harsh, fast and unapologetic. The wilderness scenery is quite evocative, but also monotonous; virtually every scene looks the same.
On that note, nearly all the Caucasian protagonists resemble each other, with their only major points of differentiation being the different colored outfits they wear (hence the identifiers above)—and the fact that one of them, the brown vest wearing Vincent, is Asian. The characters’ interchangeability might be more forgivable if any of these guys were the slightest bit interesting, but that, I’m afraid, is not the case.
Vital Statistics
PREY
Senator Film Produktion/Netflix
Director: Thomas Sieben
Producer: Barbara Mientus
Screenplay: Thomas Sieben
Cinematography: Andreas Berger
Cast: David Kross, Hanno Koffler, Maria Ehrich, Robert Finster, Yung Ngo, Klaus Steinbacher, Livia Matthes, Nellie Thalbach