Ben Wheatley names the biggest inspirations behind ‘Kill List’
From working on a comedy sketch show called Time Trumpet for the BBC to helming the $100million shark movie Meg 2: The Trench, British director Ben Wheatley has enjoyed quite the career. He’s established himself as a very desirable name, particularly within the horror genre, and the film that set him on the path to greatness was his second feature, 2011’s Kill List.
Starring Neil Maskell and Michael Smiley as two killers for hire, Kill List is a crime thriller that gets darker and darker as it unravels. Maskell’s character, Jay, is suffering from PTSD from his former life as a soldier, and his rapidly deteriorating psyche lands him and his partner in deep trouble when they sign up for a job with the wrong people.
The film became an underground hit and even won Smiley the ‘Best Supporting Actor’ prize at the British Independent Film Awards. It even came to the attention of the great Martin Scorsese, who liked it so much that he signed on as an executive producer for Wheatley’s 2016 film Free Fire. All this from a movie with a budget of just $800,000.
The director has been very candid about his influences whilst making Kill List. While speaking to Chud in 2012, he outlined some of the classic horrors he wanted to emulate. “I did a thing a while back for Film4 where I had to choose my favourite horror films, and they were things like Romero’s Dawn of the Dead and Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. He then cited the nuclear deterrent movie Threads and Ken Loach’s Ladybird Ladybird as less conventional sources of inspiration. “Those movies to me are horror films but they don’t have people jumping out trying to cut people’s heads off, but they are as or more effective than stuff that’s got loads of blood. I like psychological horror as much as actual visual, visceral.”
Wheatley also paid tribute to the work of Alan Clarke, a British director who told stories of working-class life. “He’s kind of about going from family life to extreme realistic violence, and in and out of that.” He said, mentioning Clarke’s films Scum and The Firm. “You feel you’re in the company of dangerous people.” This last statement definitely resonates with Kill List, as Jay’s ever-diminishing grip on reality makes him more and more unsettling in the eyes of the viewer.
In terms of the ending to Kill List, which comes very suddenly and without warning, Wheatley once again brought up a range of stimuli. “I always think of the end of The French Connection. They’re running around, he shoots another cop, and then they just kind of go to black. It is devastating. It doesn’t end with a court case. Or the end of Videodrome, which is fantastic.”
After taking a few years off to direct more action and period pieces, including an adaptation of Rebecca, Wheatley returned to the horror genre with 2021’s In the Earth. He also produced 2022’s Klokkenluider, a dark comedy directed by and starring his Kill List collaborator, Neil Maskell.
