Karma (Shera Bechard) is a mute Russian woman whose sister Anna (Patricia Stasiak) is dead. Anna had signed up to become a housemaid in Canada, intending to make a decent wage and live an honest life. The film gradually reveals that she’s been murdered by mobsters in the woods of Ontario, and we see Karma take her revenge on those responsible in the bloodiest way possible.
Sweet Karma is a revenge thriller much in the tradition of 70s exploitation movies, with a grim set-up and protracted scenes of retributive violence. The problem with the film is that it’s just not as entertaining as a lot of the flicks that clearly influenced it.
As often with ‘bad girl’ exploitation films, Sweet Karma occupies a dubious halfway position between male titillation and female empowerment, by giving its lead character big tits, few clothes and a penchant for castration. However this particular film is blatantly more concerned with the titillation side of things: it lazily gestures towards feminism whilst relishing the frequent scenes of pole dancing and sexual abuse.
There’s an excruciating scene in which Karma awakens to find that she’s being raped; a scene that goes on for a conspicuously long time. A brief moment afterwards when she grabs a gun and shoots the rapist’s penis off seems designed to make this OK, but I’m still not wholly convinced of director Hunt’s intentions.
Anyway, regardless of morality which you don’t exactly watch a revenge thriller for anyway the lo-fi digital photography is very murky; often, it’s so dark that you can hardly see what’s going on. Couple this with the emotional sterility of the film and you have an overall underwhelming and uninvolving experience.
No special features besides a trailer.
Overall Verdict: Grim and uninvolving revenge drama.
Special Features:
Trailer
Reviewer: Tom René