Within the first ten minutes of Why Don’t You Just Die! (2018), my jaw was on the floor! The violence lands with an unapologetic thud in this splatterfest, which is capping off the lineup at IFC Center’s 2019 “What The Fest”, a film festival that spotlights smart, bold, and inventive films from various genres for creative minds; this movie definitely fits that bill. Why Don’t You Just Die! is an easy mix of action, comedy, and suspense, and as his feature debut, was a very pleasant introduction to Russian writer/director, Kirill Sokolovit.

A dark knight named Matvei (Aleksandr Kuznetsov) — a 20-something thug dressed in a Batman sweatshirt — pumps himself up in a stairwell for an impending brawl, chanting “One, two, three, evil won’t touch me”; he is armed with a heavy hammer and a license to kill. His knock on the door is answered by a bald and bully looking man named Andrey (Vitaliy Khaev), who gruffly asks him his purpose for being there — a question playing on the audience’s minds as well. The knocker’s story: he is the boyfriend of their daughter, Olya (Evgeniya Kregzhde), who had arranged they meet that day, however, she is “running late”. The gruff man begrudgingly grants him entrance, though, as a hard-bitten and seasoned Moscow detective who happens to be a corrupt cop, he soon senses the ill intentions of his unexpected visitor. As they begin to trade blows in what escalates into a battle royale, the secrets behind each player’s motivation are brought to light in this red herring, double-crossing thriller brilliantly set in one small apartment.

Why Don’t You Just Die!, or “Papa, sdokhni” (translation: Daddy, die), has all the heart palpitation inducing thrill of a Crank (2006) movie or a Danny Boyle flick, with similar fast-paced, up-close-and-personal action, coupled with graphic violence that was, at times, as difficult for me to watch as in a Hostel (2005) movie. Though this movie is not exactly horror, it is certainly a suspense thriller that does not hold back, as the set looks like a murder scene before the bodies even start dropping — and oh boy, do they drop. Why Don’t You Just Die! takes that old horror movie trope of a character that just won’t freaking die or who otherwise repeatedly comes back to life, and with that trope, weaves an original, clever crime comedy mellowed by violent and gore-y fight scenes, and further still balanced by the melodrama of an estranged family corrupted by money and each character’s questionable morality.

The music score accompanying this one, composed by Vadim QP and Sergey Solovyov, was very entertaining and had me even more engaged in the movie; it was an interesting mix of thumping Russian band, hip hop, and even a speckle of memorable American music scores, such as the popular folk song “House of the Rising Sun” that’s used in many action movie and trailers. Why Don’t You Just Die! is also undoubtedly beautifully edited, full of slow-motion visuals to punctuate each scene and at times create a dreamy feel to the movie. The fact that this movie, save for a few cutaways for the sake of fleshing out some backstories, is mostly set in the living room of one small apartment makes it even more impressive just how exciting and gripping this narrative was. It could very easily be a quite entertaining play, and I love movies like that, such as one of my favorite Hitchcock films, Rope (1948). The cutaways serve as an insight into the motivations that drove all these players to this stage, which by the end, is a blood bath, awash in everyone’s blood. Did anyone walk away alive? You’ll have to watch to find out!

Perhaps someone more versed in Russian cinema or history could say definitively whether this movie is a satire shedding light on the common corruption that might be infiltrating Russian law and government. Nuanced or not, truly, no good deed goes unpunished for the likable, lovelorn antihero in Kirill Sokolov’s bloody and black, gut-buster of a film, Why Don’t You Just Die! Produced by White Mirror Film Company who is distributing it throughout the film festival circuit, this fun Russian film will be an excellent one to watch.