THE GREEN BUTCHERS
R, 100 mins.

Off-kilter and deliciously macabre, “The Green Butchers” is yet another welcome film from talented Dane Anders Thomas Jensen. Mr. Jensen, who previously cowrote the poignant “Open Hearts” and bittersweet “Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself,” takes on sole writing and directing duties for his devilishly funny dark comedy, opening today at Cinema Village.

Made up as a dead ringer for Christopher Walken, Mads Mikkelsen (who starred in both “Open Hearts” and “Wilbur”) plays Svend, a nervous, perpetually sweaty butcher, who, along with his only friend, Bjarne (Nikolaj Lie Kaas), opens a modest butcher shop to rival their former employer’s one. After accidentally killing their store electrician by locking him in the freezer, Svend panics and filets the man’s leg, selling him to a salivating public as “Chicky-Wickies.”

Initially to engage in this cannibalistic practice, Bjarne has his other to deal with when his mentally disabled brother wakes up from a years-long coma, tries to reconnect with him, and makes a play for his girlfriend. Playing both roles, Mr. Kaas steals the film.

Mr. Jensen is splendid at presenting unpropitious material without making it mean-spirited. He has an ability to create quirky, eccentric characters without making them seem exaggerated or unbelievable. With a slight, unpredictable twist that makes way for a pleasurably simple finale, “The Green Butchers” makes the audience feel right at home just this side of normal.

MURDER-SET-PIECES
unrated, 105 mins.

No one can accuse Nick Palumbo of false advertising. His aptly titled film “Murder-Set-Pieces,” a violent, misogynistic, very NC-17 gore-fest, is made up almost solely of scenes that diligently present human beings being dismembered in various horrible ways. A little girl takes a knife to the stomach, and is subsequently suffocated in one scene; a severed head is sodomized in another. In yet another, an antagonist named the Photographer (played by Sven Garrett) rapes a woman, quite literally to death. And these are among the film’s tamer moments.

Boasting a cast of such SAG-hopefuls as real strippers and prostitutes to play victims, the acting is often so laughably awful and amateurish that it is a delight to see horror vets Tony Todd (who gets a bullet to the chest), and Gunnar Hansen make cameo appearances. But as a storyteller Mr. Palumbo is negligible, and gore hounds will be bored stiff. This is a monotonous film, in addition to being a revolting one.