Dog Pound (2010)

Chapiron stubbornly avoids an uplifting message, portraying his dangerous setting as a demonstration of virility that leads to madness.

With largely improvised dialogue and a cast including genuine ex-offenders, Chapiron captures a powerful stench of authenticity.

The plot willfully denies our satisfaction, often at the risk of compromising its own structural integrity.

Perhaps this tells us nothing new about life on the inside in the US (there are rapes, riots and suicides), but it at least handles its brief with pace and precision.

Kim Chapiron, proves an excellent choreographer of brutality...But without a strong political point (unlike its source material), Dog Pound feels hollow and hopeless.