LION--Horror Short Movie Review

 

Multi-award-winning short LION deserves every praise that comes its way for its stark portrayal of domestic abuse against children. 

Directed by Davide Melini, the horror short sheds light on the horrors experienced by children who live in abusive homes and who have their childhood stolen from them. 

After a stylized opening credits, we are quickly brought towards a house where all we hear are the sounds of a child being hit and his weak cries for help. 

When we finally enter the house, the violence is over, but the evidence of abuse is visible as bruises on the little child’s face. His pleas for help are barely a whisper, but they are supposedly heard by his guardian. The director expertly shows the child’s fascination for lions through posters and drawings, and even the stuffed toy that he hugs for comfort. 

The child may have cried himself to sleep several nights, but on a snowy winter night, his protector has finally decided to intervene. 

We see the father, drunk on several beers, and demanding more from a wife who has long learned to be a silent witness of abuse. She is always in the kitchen, away from her inebriated husband, and catering to his every demand. He wants more beer? Well, he shall have it just so he wouldn’t cause any more violence. 

The father is mindlessly channel surfing when he nods off. When he awakens, he orders another beer while realizing he cannot flick away from footage of lions in the wild. He watches them with disdain as the lions hunt their prey. He sneers as one of the lions looks straight into the camera and slowly advances. 

He then lunges at the father. 

The wife hears the screams. The atmospheric tension is brilliant as the lights go off and she slowly creeps into the living room, only to find a dismembered hand. The very hand that the father used to beat his child. 

She screams and sees a pair of glowing eyes. The mother hides under a bed, but she will not be spared either. She never protected her child. Her silence made her just as guilty. 

The lion is almost personified as it stalks its prey before attacking. 

The child awakens, and when the bedroom door opens, the lion walks in, reminding him that he was right to never give up hope. The child approaches the lion, and in the next second, the animal has vanished, but in its place is the stuffed toy. 

There is blood splattered everywhere, but the child picks up the toy and heads back to bed, relieved to finally feel safe again. 

LION is a prominent and necessary story that needs to be told and shared. Its message is simple: a child should never be subjected to violence. 

Even in the movie, the child is spared from watching his abusers be attacked. He only sees the toy or the protector. 

This distinction is what highlights the movie. The parents indulged in violence and were killed violently. 

The child was innocent and was spared from witnessing it all. The child gets back in bed feeling safe, knowing that the lions around him are his guardians. 

 Written & Directed by Davide Melini

Cast: Pedro Sánchez, Michael Segal, Tania Mercader

Release Date: 2017

Scare Scale: 4/5