I thought this film was very good up until it is revealed that the sniper is a child with his brother who has a double barrelled shotgun out in the woods and mountains, playing a so called game called 'King Of The Hill'. If you weren't on the main character's side before, knowing now that the killers are a couple of stupid kids (the children are in no way menacing and i think the acting looks as if they should be, but couldn't quite do menacing as they are children) should have made you completely on his side by now.
I'm not saying that having kids as the killers wasn't an effective idea; as I had no idea it was going to be children, and indeed it worked a treat in my opinion. However, for me, this idea lead to a disastrous ending, with the film portraying a somewhat guilt filled, failed meaningful point from the main character's perspective that 'It's just a kid, I can't kill a child' (the struggling and biting child effectively pushes him to drown the boy), which seems to cross the main character's mind when he gets the upper hand on the child stalkers with guns. Here's the thing,If your entire day was being governed (to put it politely) by someone who was shooting at you (and who already shot you in the leg) regularly from a distance, pinning you down, killing your friend, randomly killing animals, effectively hunting you down into the ground; it's simply not conceivable that you would develop a conscience when you finally get to meet the one who was shooting at you.
I'm not saying that having kids as the killers wasn't an effective idea; as I had no idea it was going to be children, and indeed it worked a treat in my opinion. However, for me, this idea lead to a disastrous ending, with the film portraying a somewhat guilt filled, failed meaningful point from the main character's perspective that 'It's just a kid, I can't kill a child' (the struggling and biting child effectively pushes him to drown the boy), which seems to cross the main character's mind when he gets the upper hand on the child stalkers with guns. Here's the thing,If your entire day was being governed (to put it politely) by someone who was shooting at you (and who already shot you in the leg) regularly from a distance, pinning you down, killing your friend, randomly killing animals, effectively hunting you down into the ground; it's simply not conceivable that you would develop a conscience when you finally get to meet the one who was shooting at you.