By George & Josh Bate
Asia Argento is a name that carries an entire history of arthouse and genre cinema with it. The daughter of horror icon Dario Argento, she has spent decades moving between the worlds of European art cinema and more overtly pulpy fare, appearing in films like The Stendhal Syndrome, New Rose Hotel, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, Land of the Dead, and Mother of Tears, while also directing films like Scarlet Diva. Her public profile became even more complicated during the rise of the #MeToo movement, when she emerged as one of its most prominent voices after accusing Harvey Weinstein of rape, after which she faced an allegation of her own. In Jorge Thielen Armand’s Death Has No Master, Argento occupies the lead role in a film that possesses a similar blend of provocative, edgy themes and psychological horror couched in arthouse drama that her movies are often associated with, although the ultimate result miscalculates where to go from an admittedly intriguing first act.
Screening at this year’s Fantastic Fest, Death Has No Master stars Argento as Caro, a woman who returns from Italy to Venezuela following the death of her father to sell the dilapidated cacao plantation where she grew up. Upon arriving, she discovers that the family estate is occupied by Sonia (Dogreika Tovar), a former employee, her young son Maiko (Yermain Sequera), and several other tenants Sonia has taken in. Caro initially agrees to share the house, but, when she makes itclear that she intends to sell the property, Sonia refuses to leave, arguing that she has as much right to the home as Caro does. The police have little interest in intervening, forcing Caro to seek help elsewhere. What begins as an increasingly uncomfortable dispute over property gradually turns violent, dragging Caro into the ugly history of colonialism, dispossession, and brutality that surrounds the estate.
Despite Argento being the recognizable star, it is Dogreika Tovar who immediately stands out. A non-professional actor, Tovar brings an incredible presence to Sonia, carrying herself with an intimidation and assurance fitting for the morally complex character she takes on. There is something inherently compelling about watching her occupy the same space as Argento because Sonia always seems to possess the upper hand. Argento is merely serviceable as Caro, never quite bringing the kind of complexity or nuance that would make the character feel like more than what is on the page. That becomes increasingly noticeable as the film attempts to dig into Caro’s history through brief flashbacks and visions of violence. These sequences are woefully underdeveloped and largely unexplained, doing little beyond padding the runtime and giving the illusion that Caro is a more fully realized character than she actually is.
The real star of Death Has No Master, however, might be the house itself. This is hardly the grand estate Caro seems to imagine will be worth a fortune. It is dilapidated, decaying, and almost swallowed by the surrounding forest. The state of the house is particularly interesting given that this is the property Caro is so desperate to reclaim. The estate becomes a physical manifestation of everything the film is interested in: inherited wealth, colonial ownership, decay, and the increasingly tenuous idea that simply having a legal claim to something makes it truly yours. Caro and Sonia initially bond, at least superficially, over their shared connection to the dying house, but there is something performative about Caro’s sympathy as she still wants Sonia gone.
Nobody in Death Has No Master is particularly likable, and the film isn’t especially interested in giving the audience an easy person to root for. Even Sonia, arguably the more compelling figure, isn’t infallible. She has effectively claimed the building for herself and rents rooms out to strangers, making her own claim to moral superiority considerably more complicated. Caro legally has a right to the property, but the people who have lived there have their own claim to it, one that isn’t necessarily recognized by the law.
The opening sequence, which depicts the Spanish colonization of Venezuela in an abstract, almost dreamlike manner, establishes the film’s larger concerns from the beginning. And watching Death Has No Master in 2026, it is difficult not to view those ideas alongside the U.S. military operation that removed Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro earlier this year and the subsequent American involvement in Venezuela’s political and economic future. Caro arrives in Venezuela wanting to assert ownership over land she can legally claim, while the locals, including the police, have little interest in honoring that claim. The parallels aren’t that subtle, but they are undeniably interesting and prescient.
Unfortunately, Death Has No Master begins to meander after a genuinely strong first act. The setup compels as Caro arrives, the house is occupied, and Sonia refuses to leave, creating a colonial conflict to unfold. From there, however, the film spends too much time circling the inevitable. Caro lies around in bed, stares at drawings made by her deceased father, and drifts through the estate while the story waits for her to make the choices we know she is going to make. There is a sense that the film is building toward something inevitable, but it takes too long to get there. When the third act finally arrives, it is underwhelming in part because the film has spent so much time promising a reckoning that the eventual payoff doesn’t quite feel earned. The violence comes quickly, and just as quickly, it’s over.
VERDICT: 5/10
Death Has No Master is an intriguing, yet miscalculated collision of colonial horror, arthouse drama, and slow-burn thriller, built around a decaying house and two women with very different claims to the same piece of land. Asia Argento may be the recognizable star, but Dogreika Tovar provides the film’s most compelling presence, while Jorge Thielen Armand’s strongest ideas emerge through the crumbling estate, the uneasy power dynamics, and the lingering legacy of colonialism. There is plenty here to admire, particularly in its atmosphere and its willingness to complicate the idea of victim and perpetrator, but the film struggles to give its central characters the depth its themes demand. It meanders through the middle, its visions of Caro’s violent past feel woefully underdeveloped, and its third act takes too long to arrive only to end too quickly. Death Has No Master has some genuinely interesting and prescient ideas at play, but it ultimately doesn’t entirely come together, despite its admirable commitment to a staunch anti-colonial message.