Review // The Purge: Election Year

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If you’ve been following any type of news lately you probably know that our neighbours down south are in the middle of an election. We hear about it constantly, and if you’re like me, being bombarded by the coverage might make you wish you could just smash your TV or punch your computer screen to make it stop. If we lived in James DeMonaco’s twisted version of America, we could just let out our frustration on the annual Purge Night, a 12-hour window when all crime – even murder – is legal. In The Purge: Election Year, DeMonaco shows us what he thinks society would do if given that opportunity, and while it might be fun to think about, it really wasn’t exciting to watch.

This is the third film in DeMonaco’s Purge franchise, but the first to be a direct sequel. Frank Grillo returns as Leo Barnes, a former police sergeant who now specializes in private security. His current client is U.S. Senator Charlie Roan (Elizabeth Mitchell), the leading candidate in the upcoming general election. Roan’s anti-Purge platform has sparked a wave of support from low income and minority groups across the country who believe the Purge was created by the current government, a group called the New Founding Fathers of America, to target them; by eliminating lower class citizens, the NFFA can cut spending on health care, low income housing, social security, etc. Realizing how slim their chances of winning re-election are, the NFFA hire a mercenary group of Neo-Nazi soldiers to assassinate her during Purge Night. With some quick intervention from Barnes, the attempt on her life fails and the two flee onto the streets of Washington D.C. to survive the night. Along the way they get help from Joe Dixon (Mykelti Williamson), a deli owner trying to protect his business, and his two loyal employees: Marcos (Joseph Julian Soria), a Mexican immigrant, and Laney (Betty Gabriel), a former “celebrity purger” who now spends purge night driving a triage van.

DeMonaco wrote the script for Election Year back in 2014 – a midterm election year in the U.S. – so it’s not entirely surprising that he decided to add some politics to The Purge. It’s an interesting idea to explore, but if he wanted to take it that way I think he would have been better served showing us the politics behind how the Purge even started. How did the NFFA rise to power? What was the sentiment in the country that led to voters all of a sudden being cool with killing their neighbour and their loud dog? That’s what I want to know.

For the most part the cast do the best with what they’re given. Grillo can really pull off the no-nonsense security expert role, and he plays a great straight man to Williamson’s deli owner Joe whose constant quips and one-liners had the audience chuckling. However it was painful watching Elizabeth Mitchell’s Senator character, not so much for her acting but for the fact that her character does so many stupid things that you end up hoping she would die.

The advertising for Election Year used the tagline “Keep America Great”, an obvious shout-out to Donald Trump’s infamous “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan. If I was forced to choose between watching Trump speeches for two hours or another helping of The Purge, I think I’d pick Trump. The things he says are funnier, more shocking, and it wouldn’t cost me a dime.

Reviewed by Kyle Miller.