The Evil That Men Do 2015

In Suriname, the film presents a stark, unflinching opening: Clement Molloch, known as “The Doctor,” brutalizes a journalist named Jorge Hidalgo with electricity in a room crowded with government officials. The scene sets a chilling tone, establishing Molloch as a sadistic figure who tortures to send a message. Outside, a separate thread unfolds as an Israeli Mossad team attempts to plant a bomb under the Doctor’s car. The mission starts with promise but quickly spirals into violence—the operation fails, and one member of the team is killed, underscoring that Molloch’s reach is both vast and dangerous.

Meanwhile, in the tranquil surroundings of the Cayman Islands, Holland—retired from an old life of assassination—enjoys the quiet he’s carved for himself. His peace is interrupted when an old associate asks him to take on Molloch. Holland initially refuses, preserving the illusion of a peaceful existence. Yet the weight of Jorge Hidalgo’s death, coupled with video testimonies from Molloch’s victims across Chile, Asia, and other corners of the world, makes the mission feel personal and urgent. The decision marks a dramatic shift: he agrees to search for the Doctor, but he wants to remain undercover as a typical family man—a tourist, a neighbor, a father in law’s shoes—so he travels to Guatemala with Jorge’s widow Rhiana and her daughter Sarah.

The trio is soon joined by Max Ortiz, a friend who serves as their guide into Molloch’s web. Their first lead brings them to a cockfighting ring frequented by the Doctor, a place that hints at the world Molloch operates in—brutal, loud, and brimming with danger. They are briefly tailed by a man who looks disabled, though Holland notices the ruse and warns him, turning a moment of potential peril into a narrow escape. Max then ferries them to Molloch’s compound, offering a view of the scale and security surrounding the Doctor’s operations. Holland returns under the cover of darkness, noting the same suspicious figure now moving as if without impediment, and begins to map out his planned moves by watching the lights and cameras.

Information gathering takes Holland and Rhiana to a local bar, where the tension of the hunt becomes personal. A large local man harasses Rhiana, and Holland responds with decisive violence, crushing the aggressor’s testicles and then his neck as the crowd erupts in applause. The incident draws the attention of other henchmen, signaling that Molloch’s reach is not limited to the Doctor’s doorstep. In a bid to protect themselves and to flush out Molloch’s men, Holland and Rhiana craft a ruse, inviting a henchman back to their hotel for a volatile tryst, only to kill him with a knife. The danger mounts, and Rhiana’s resolve hardens; she refuses to turn back, insisting she wants to see the Doctor fall in person.

Holland escalates, staging a bold abduction to lure the Doctor out of hiding. He breaks into a hotel room to seize Claire, Molloch’s sister, trembling beneath the domestic calm. Claire returns with her female partner, and Holland hides, waiting for them to depart. When a male henchman enters and lights up a joint, Holland makes his move, capturing the man and using the chaos to seize Claire. He forcibly removes her from the room, and in a dramatic escape, he uses a fire hose tied around the captive to drop him from a balcony, a public display intended to create a distraction for their flight. They flee to a ranch owned by Max, where Holland urges his friend to vanish from Molloch’s reach.

What follows is a brutal escalation. Molloch has local militia seize Max and torture him to extract Holland’s hideout. A call to negotiate reveals the Doctor’s knowledge of their location, tightening the noose around the trio. In a desperate bid for safety, Holland stashes Claire in the trunk of a car and drives away with Rhiana, pursued by assassins sent by the U.S. ambassador, a figure Molloch has corrupted with money and influence. After a fierce firefight and a dangerous chase, the ambush ends with a deadly crash, and Claire dies in the cramped trunk.

With the urgency intensifying, Holland and Rhiana purchase a farmer’s truck and press onward to the village of Magdalena, still pursued by the ambassador and his gunmen. They find a local cafe owner who offers a call to aid, and Holland arms himself with the power to cut through their pursuers. He corners Molloch at a mine and dares him to come alone to retrieve Claire, their leverage dwindling as the Doctor’s forces close in.

At the mine, disfigured men search for opal, a grim reminder of Molloch’s violent past and his history of cruelty. The miners insist on staying; they refuse to abandon their danger, and Molloch approaches in the open. A tense confrontation unfolds, and Molloch’s grip on power begins to crumble under the miners’ collective memory of the injuries he inflicted. In the chaos, a miner strikes Molloch, and the car’s chauffeur—who still clutches Sarah—becomes distracted. Holland seizes the chance and kills him, freeing Sarah to run to Rhiana’s side. The miners, enraged and vengeful, converge on Molloch’s vehicle and kill him with hammers and picks, a blunt and graphic retribution for the crimes he has committed.

The final act brings Holland, Rhiana, and Sarah back to the safety of Holland’s home in the Cayman Islands. The journey has transformed them: the fear and urgency of a life-or-death pursuit have yielded to a quiet, albeit hard-won, sense of closure. The Doctor’s reign of terror is brought to an abrupt, brutal end, not by a single heroic shot, but by the miners’ collective memory and the relentless pursuit of a desperate family. In the end, the trio finds a fragile peace, a return to ordinary life after a mission that stretched them to the limits of endurance, and a reminder that justice, when it arrives, can do so in unexpected and devastating ways.