Sensation (UK 2021: Dir Martin Grof) NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021

Remember Spooks? That BBC TV series which was so low budgeted that it necessitated actors sitting around in glamorous looking locations (mainly offices and boardrooms) talking emphatically about things the programme makers couldn't actually afford to show? Well stylistically and narratively Grof's second feature pulls off the same trick, while mining a whole host of cinematic influences too.

Lowly postman (and violin virtuoso, but we'll get to that later) Andrew Cooper (Eugene Simon) knows little about his past, and decides to share his DNA to check whether he has other relatives and/or siblings. The test results work their way into the hands of a secretive organisation headed up by the colourful and more than slightly eccentric Dr Marinus (Alastair G. Cumming) who, telling the young lad that there is something special about him, introduces Andrew to a country house research facility where he can learn more about himself. At the facility he meets other young people who are similarly gifted in different ways. Andrew's room comes complete with a violin and he confesses that he has learned to play to a high standard by copying videos; he also faces off henchman Ernesto (Alex Reid, surely a Dave Prowse for nos jours) who he manages to beat off: I mean up. So Andrew's clearly a young chap of some gifts.

The group are in the care of the rather robotic Nadia (Emily Wyatt) and May (Jennifer Martin), the former who was adopted by the Russians following the death of her parents. Marinus's grandfather was in league with the Nazis and the Doctor has continued his relative's research into the enhancement of sensory receptors among conjoined twins, which heighten sensitivity in each of the subjects being studied within the facility. But the more Andrew finds out the less he (and the audience) understand; no-one there can be trusted, and he starts to doubt everything he sees and hears.

There are so many plotlines that fizzle out in Sensation that even after multiple viewings (I didn't but I'm making a point here) you'd be hard pressed to make head from tail about what's going on here. I suspect that some hard decisions had to be made editing the thing in post; the movie includes a final reel, surprisingly gloomy plot flip that piles on the WTFery, which may just have been a compromise to wrap the whole thing up but just makes everything we've seen before look a bit daft.

On the plus side the film makes great use of its London locations including the newly modernised financial district (although if the plushness of Andrew's north London gaff is to believed, the Post Office must have improved its salary package in recent years), recalling Geoffrey Sax's 2006 teen-friendly London romp Stormbreaker, if a lot less exciting.

Somewhere in the midst of this rather silly and portentous movie there's a three part TV series for the YA crowd struggling to get out; at least the plot would get a chance to breathe in that format. But Sensation is just a handsome looking mess, with variable acting by people who could probably have done better given more rounded characters. Disappointing.

Sensation will be available on Digital Download from 16th April

A nostalgia for an age yet to come - RIP the Civic Centre, London Borough of Hounslow (1976 - 2021)

Taking a break from the films for a moment for a bit of personal history.

How nostalgic is it possible to get about a building, albeit a (relatively) modern one? The Civic Centre of the London Borough of Hounslow, designed by the Council's Borough Architect George Trevett, was built in 1975, opened in March 1976, and existed for just over 44 years. That's not a great innings for a project which, at the time, officially cost £4.9 million (although I heard rumours of a much higher figure, something approaching double that). Contrast this with the former Town Hall, which was built in the 1880s and demolished around a hundred years later, ironically to make way for a hideous and largely unwanted shopping centre.

Its construction aimed to be the final piece in a jigsaw that united three distinct Council areas into one London borough via a 1965 Act of Parliament. The Act recognised the need to centralise decision making and eliminate waste created by 'local' local government. Unfortunately 10 years is a long time in politics, and the opening of the Civic Centre coincided with central Government beginning its policy of reducing the public funding of local authorities; the building became a potential white elephant almost as soon as the staff had moved in.

I started work there on 6 November 1978, aged 17, and despite the often mundane nature of the business going on inside, the building never failed to amaze me (the pictures accompanying this post don't really do it justice). Its orange and brown mid century modern stylings (much of the original interior design had been imported; the rumour ran that the company who provided the materials went bust, so the borough was forced from the outset to make building repairs from other sources, leading to the cohesion of the original look being quickly lost) captured my teenage imagination in a unique way: I felt that I was working on the set of a Gerry Anderson TV series. 

If you're around my age (very late fifties) you'll recall the familiar lament of my generation that we thought we'd be living in an episode of The Jetsons by now, all aerial living and labour saving devices. Well the Civic Centre didn't exactly fulfil the dream, but it did recall the already-out-of-date-but-still-strangely-futuristic look created by Tony Masters, Harry Lange and Ernest Archer for the interiors of Kubrick's 1968 movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, a film that had left a lasting impression on me when I saw it in the ABC Hounslow aged 8.

The Civic Centre was my first permanent place of work; the open plan nature meant that I was suddenly thrust into occupying an office with over a hundred people. The building was designed as four interconnected pavillions on two floors, each serviced by a rest area - complete with resident tea lady - and with a restaurant, games room, bank and (this was to be my downfall) bar on the premises. I cannot describe what it was like to, effectively, move straight from the classroom - no University for me - to this adult environment. 

It was my first time watching adults argue in front of me (something my parents never did), occasionally throw punches, and of course get drunk; sometimes at their desk. I fell in love there, did a lot of stupid things (walking into the Borough Valuer's office after a lunchtime drinking session and commenting to him that the building plan on his desk looked "a bit crap if you ask me" being one of them), and, eventually, became ground down with the relentless tediousness of office life.

But if the future of the Civic Centre had started looking bleak in the mid 1970s, by the early 2000s (long after I left in 1992) the writing was on the wall. Trevett's dream was a part empty shell; successive years (decades) of Government cutbacks had created a revolution in the way that local government, formerly a rather wasteful institution, now provided complex services pretty efficiently with around half its original staff. The building in which they worked was now much less important than forty years previously; a positive thing, but also one which left the Civic Centre woefully underoccupied, expensive to run, and arguably an embarassment rather than a flagship. 

The postscript to this is that the remaining Council staff moved out to smaller, more eco-friendly premises nearby and as of January this year, the demolition teams had moved in to pull down the Civic Centre and, in its place, build luxury flats.  I'm not going to pass judgment on whether those places will be given to those in housing need or sold to make profits for developers, although a look around at the rest of London indicates the latter.

Whatever happens, the physical erasure of a place where I spent 14 years working will always be a sad thing, but luckily my memory can help me out here. All I have to do is close my eyes and, like the Overlook Hotel in Stephen King's 'The Shining,' the building comes alive all over again. 

Rest in peace you weird and wonderful monolith.

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2020 #15: Reviews of Scopophobia (UK 2020), Zoom (UK 2020), Bite Night (UK 2020), Russian Submarine (UK 2020), Eve (UK 2019) and Dune Drifter (UK 2020)

Scopophobia (UK 2020: Dir Ben Smith) Scopophobia is, apparently, defined as an excessive fear of being stared at. Clocking in at getting on for two hours, this viewer spent an awful lot of time staring at the screen waiting for something to happen. For Scopophobia is nothing if not a langorous watch.

A group of school age filmmakers are preparing to make a feature film, working title 'Among the Woods', in a nearby forest area. One of their number, Nick, goes missing; meanwhile one of the others, Inaam (Inaam Barwani) receives a mysterious package containing warning notes. As filming progresses, a mysterious knife wielding figure is seen in the woods, wearing a mask. Inaam begins to lose track of time, and some of the cast/crew (it's a small production) end up waking up in the open air. They realise that the film's script itself might be cursed, and causing the events affecting them; but the truth is even stranger than that.

Scopophobia as a project has ambitions way beyond the skills of those behind and in front of the camera, and its arse numbing length does it no favours. But underneath the zero budget look of the thing, and the variable acting skills on display, it's clear that some work has gone into the story, and there are elements within the film - the time shift scenes, the coded messages received, and the meta film-within-a film moments etc - that are genuinely intriuging. Unfortunately there's a lack of clarity in the storytelling, particularly towards the end, when the film attempts to draw its loose ends together: shorter and punchier would definitely have been better. Smith is clearly still learning his art, and there's just enough here to suggest that some attention should be paid to his next feature.

You can watch Scopophobia here.

Zoom aka Catering (UK 2020: Dir Matthew Landford) This 36 minute short starts with a Zoom conversation between three friends, Miles (Alex Brook), Roddy (Samuel Grant) and Sigmund (Harvey Smith). They're bored and have used up all their usual diversions like role play and card games. Randomly searching they come across a Twitter account belonging to 'joel8946'. They decide to access his account and, before long, they're thrown into a nightmare, where their new host warns them that they shouldn't have joined and rejoins the call even after being kicked out.

First to be threatened is Roddy's little brother, who Roddy thinks is safe downstairs. But is he? Next the omnipresent host forces his callers to admit a series of misdemeanours, the very least of which is Sigmund's confession that he once ate Roddy's goldfish. Failure to disclose their secrets will result in them being removed.

While Zoom undoubtedly borrows from Rob Savage's game changing Host (the "how did you get onto the call?" question and the subsonic rumbling announcing the presence of the sinister Joel), Brook, Grant and Smith are very convincing as three wisecracking friends whose camaraderie very swiftly breaks down in the face of a mysterious threat. Landford has made a number of short films which will be covered in this strand, and can be watched on YouTube. Recommended.

You can watch Zoom here. 

Bite Night (UK 2020: Dir Maria Lee Metheringham) There are a lot of indepedent horror films made these days whose creators talk about trying to capture a 1980s vibe. Very often (and often poorly) this is realised by a brooding synth score and a broadly colourful lighting design. Metheringham's follow up to 2018's Pumpkins doesn't aim for such a feel in its design but Bite Night conjours up memories of numerous daft 'kids-mixing-with succubii' movies of that decade in its execution.

At a nightclub a three woman band play to an enthusiastic audience; they are Zuzanna (Metheringham), Katarina (Martha Niklas) and Valice (Rachel Brownstein). Tonight, courtesy of a number of tickets randomly inserted into balloons, six lucky fans will be given the chance to accompany the girls back to their house for an exclusive after party.

The six, who include preppy Ebeneizer (George Walker) and feisty Tash (Marcella Edgecombe-Craig), get ferried by limo to the cottage, aka the 'House of Valice', where they're invited to freshen up in their allocated rooms. There's an increasingly predatory sense that the girls have something in mind for their guests apart from wall to wall partying; Valice takes a shine to Tash and seduces her, while punky Axel (Ryan Jay-James) finds one of Katarina's dresses and puts it on. Later, everyone meets in the dining room, and the girls announce their culinary inclinations by serving up a severed head and dipping a stick of celery into the blood. But just as the three girls turn all vampy/cannibal-y, there's another more terrifying figure who starts to take over the guests. Who will survive?

I use the word 'scrappy' quite a lot to describe a form of filmmaking which is rough round the edges, well intentioned but slimly budgeted; and Bite Night ticks all three of these boxes. The movie feels like it might at any point get a lot more raunchy than it does, but the cast are all good value and, considering that not much happens, things move at a fair clip. Of particular note are the songs performed by the girls (sung by the three actresses) written by 'Great Northern Hotel' and the film's incidental score by Leigh 'Scratch' Fenlon and Jerry de Borg, and some enthusiastic performances by Edgecombe-Craig and Brownstein, who have fun with the frequently camp dialogue. Bite Night's story is 'to be continued...' according to the end credits. Well ok then.

Russian Submarine (UK 2020: Dir Tommi Sorsa) This 50 minute featurette, shot in Bournemouth, opens with a Biblical quote. There isn't a reason for this and it's no more illuminating than the rest of the film.

What I think is happening is that, in a 2009 prologue, a group of young men (and one woman) hold a drinking party in a house (the name of which - the game not the house - is 'Russian Submarine', hence the title) and all die of alcohol poisoning.

Moving to the present day, a young couple rent the house, only to be haunted by the ghost of the last member standing from the original group. To deal with the unwanted supernatural visitation they bring in a team of ghostbusters, complete with resident psychic, who quickly realise that to engage with the spirits at a meaningful level they too have to play the 'Russian Submarine' game. Oh and as well as the ghost there's also an evil jester/clown character called Cletus, a figure whose spiritual ancestry may date from the medieval period of history.

I would recommend that Russian Submarine is best watched with the viewer imbibing the same amout of alcohol as the cast; you won't understand it any better but it may feel like it's over quicker. This is a film that chooses to include outtake scenes both during the movie and after it. The cast all inexplicably have American accents (and to be fair some of these are well rendered) which sits rather oddly in the setting of a Bournemouth semi. Scenes are repeated endlessly and if there's a point to this it was totally lost on me. Look I'm sure this was a lot of fun to make - many of the cast look like they're on the verge of 'corpsing' most of the time - but it sure isn't to sit through, unless you're an 'in-on-the-joke' student presumably.

You can watch Russian Submarine here. 

Eve (UK 2019: Dir Rory Kindersley) This glossy, psychological thriller aims for Nicolas Winding Refn or maybe Daren Aronofsky in its intensity, but sadly falls short through a combination of unlikeable characters and opaque plotting.

Alex Beyer (American Christine Marzano sporting a pretty good Brit accent) is an actor no longer getting the parts she wants, after being out of the business for over a year (her mental health is clearly not great). Turned down for the role of 'Eve' in a film version of a play in which she was the lead, her day gets worse when, returning to her swish London mews house with photographer boyfriend Liam (Andrew Lee Potts) which he's let out in their absence, she discovers that someone has daubed blood all over the walls. The police suspect it might be a jealous fan (the pair don't exactly fall over themselves to find out).

Alex continues to obsess both about the loss of the role and the identity of the home defacer (CCTV footage shows a woman standing outside their front door; a possible suspect?). Meanwhile her agent despairs at what to do with her, and gets the opportunity to drop her from the books when Alex assaults the actor who got the 'Eve' part when they bump into each other at an audition.Alex's downward spiral continues apace, to the point where she's not only a danger to herself, but maybe to others as well.

Eve is one of those movies where everybody is horrible, so it's difficult to care less about any of the characters; probably the most sympathetic is Liam, but even he may be having an affair with a client. I'm getting a bit sick of 'crazy lady' scenarios, where the instability of the lead means that the audience can't trust whether what they're seeing is fantasy or reality. Kindersley's movie looks good, but it's empty as hell and ultimately inconsequential; all dressed up with nowhere to go, in fact.

Dune Drifter (UK 2020: Dir Marc Price) Price has come a a long way since his £45 budgeted 2003 feature debut, the intimate zombie in the suburbs movie Colin. But maybe not thematically, as his latest, a low budget sci fi drama, quickly focuses its story on a lone survivor of battle who has to face hazardous alien elements.

Adler (Phoebe Sparrow) is the gunner in a small two person spaceship, part of the Dune squadron, who enter an intergalactic fracas with a race called the Drekks on instructions to do little more than make up the numbers. But the opposition have the upper hand: ill-equipped for battle, one by one the squadron craft are picked off, with Adler and her ship's pilot Yaren (Daisy Aitkens) crash landing on an alien planet. Left on her own after Yaren dies from injuries sustained during the crash, and with the remainder of her fleet having abandoned her, assuming that she has perished, Adler's outlook, and indeed her life support duration, seem critical. But worse is to come; there's another crashed ship on the planet containing some armed Drekks, who stand between her and any hope of returning to earth.

Filmed in the inhospitable volcanic wastes of Iceland, Dune Drifter certainly manages to be bleak. Its stripped down story, with no character detail or extraneous plot information, gives us half an hour of not particularly convincing space battle, then dumps its human survivor in the middle of nowhere and throws things at her. There's some wry humour at work here - some gaseous attacking rocks seem to have strolled in from an episode of Star Trek and one of Adler's many adversities is a stray lock of hair in her eyes (which, being inside a pressurised helmet, she can do nothing about). This is a brave hour and a half and Dune Drifter remains watchable largely for Sparrow's convincing performance as the soldier who just wants to get home. It doesn't hold a candle to bigger budgeted space sagas (and will doubtless be criticised as a result of that unfair comparsion) but Dune Drifter is a watchable and at times tense sci fi flick.

NEW WAVE OF THE BRITISH FANTASTIC FILM 2021 # 1: Reviews of Bats: The Awakening (UK 2021), The Heiress (UK 2021), Righteous Villains (UK 2020) and The Banishing (UK 2020)

Bats: The Awakening (UK 2021: Dir Scott Jeffrey, Rebecca Matthews) Jeffrey's first film for 2021 (I'm sure there will be more, he directed three last year and produced six more) with his stablemate Matthews (aka Becca Hirani) under their Proportion Productions banner.

Three Americans (ok Brits with US accents, two blokes and a girl) break into an English country cottage; a decade previously the area was subject to nuclear contamination and mass evacuation. They've come to party, which involves them taking turns in bedding the clearly virginal girl ("it wasn't as bad as I thought," she says). In the grand tradition of characters in horror films being punished for sexual transgressions, two are killed by a strange man bat who lives in the attic; the other guy is bitten to death by more conventional versions of our leathery-winged friends.

Three weeks later Jamie King (Megan Purvis) is grieving the death of her fiancee Matty (Mat Sibal; fun fact, he was elevated to DoP after the first one walked off the shoot half way through). She's both afraid to move on with her life, and also wants to treasure his memory. Her mum Lisa (Amanda-Jade Tyler) and sister Amelia (Georgia Conlan) are concerned for her welfare, as is Jamie's grandmother Georgie (Kate Sandison), who needs to go back to her 'ranch' in Nosferatu Village (I kid you not), the same house in which the kids in the prologue broke in. But no sooner have they returned, to an area where the radiation warning signs still stand, than the strange man bat stalks the family, maiming and infecting Georgie and closing in on the rest of the family.

Shot in six days on a very small budget, Jeffrey and Matthews' film really is a game of two halves; the first is a rather soapy bit of exposition as the relationship between the characters is a little shakily explained; but the second half, where the family come under siege, is actually pretty tense. The fact that shooting wrapped the day before the first lockdown, meaning that all editing had to be done without reshoots, means that the story is at times a little confusing. 

But there's a lot to like about Bats: the Awakening. The man bat creation is, for the most part, a rather scary creation (although the less you see the more effective it is). There are some great practical effects here, sparingly used (a head peeling, the result of the creature's cry, is very effective). Also Greg Birkumshaw's score is very good, although I'm not sure it's as 80s sounding as the directors would have liked (Jeffrey and Matthews had mentioned that they were trying for an 80s vibe in the movie, but I couldn't really see it) - it's murkier, more like 70s BBC Radiophonic Workshop with hints of classic Italian horror scores, but offsets the darker moments very well indeed.

Bats: the Awakening will be released by ITN Distribution later in 2021

The Heiress (UK 2021: Dir Chris Bell) Claire and Anna Tate (Candis Nergaard and Jayne Wisener) are sisters who enjoy a close bond: when we first meet them they’re at a wake following the funeral of their grandmother, Abigail. It is immediately apparent that Anna is the stronger of the two; Claire, who is epileptic and heavily medicated, reads a poem to the guests and is then forced to rest. She has a troubling vision of a burning building.

The sisters’ parents are keen to clear Abigail’s house as soon as possible. When Claire and Anna visit, Anna finds an old book on witchcraft, which contains a story about a woman who does a deal with a witch to be rid of her terrible husband, with the soul of her daughter being forfeit in return, and the promise delivered via a fire which consumes both the husband and the woman’s two sons. Following the funeral Claire’s health deteriorates, and she has fleeting glimpses of an old woman and a child. Anna’s decision to cheer her sister up, by double dating on an evening out with Anna’s boyfriend Dan (David Wayman) and Dan’s boorish mate Brad (director Chris Bell) is an unwise one, and comes to an abrupt end back home when Brad also has a vision of a young boy wearing a mask.

Claire becomes convinced that the story she read might be true and that a curse has been visited on the family; pretty much everybody else, Anna and her sister’s doctor included, believe that the problems entirely exist in Claire’s mind. The only person who believes Claire is local priest, Father O’Shea (David Schaal), who has knowledge of Abigail’s dark history.

Chris Bell’s latest feature couldn’t be more different to his last, 2015’s Hooligans at War: North and South, the only thing in common being the Essex and Kent locations. Bell here offers a much more subtle piece concentrating principally on the tortured Claire (a superb performance from Negaard). The only ‘war’ here is between science and faith; for most of the film, the viewer is in doubt as to whether Claire’s visions are a product of her own illness or the manifestation of something external and deadly.

The Heiress is, for most of its running time, a character piece looking at the impact of grief and its effects both on those directly affected and the people who live with those facing loss. As such it’s a subtle film and all the better for it. The slow, creeping dread of the family’s growing realisation that Claire’s torment is supernatural rather than medical takes place among the prosaic locations of suburban sitting rooms and hospital wards, which makes The Heiress all the more scary. 

The Heiress is released on VOD from 15 March 2021

Righteous Villains (UK 2020: Dir Savvas D. Michael) 'The Anti Woke Backlash' proclaims the trailer for Michael's latest guns 'n' er more guns outing, which he wrote, directed and released via his 'Saints and Savages' distribution company (previously 'Macho Movies Ltd'). Michael's shtick is British gangster features, shot on the mean streets of London, and to some extent Righteous Villains is no different to his previous flicks (2016's Smoking Guns, Red Devil from 2019 and his companion piece to this one, Original Gangster, also made in 2020) although here the effing, jeffing and gunplay are mixed with some satanic elements.

Jeremiah (Jamie Crew, in a performance of vowel - and consonant - mangling intensity) is a scam artisit, diddling little old ladies out of their belongings. At the place where he fences his booty, he's given a tipoff to meet a mystical guy in a car breakers yard. At the rendezvous he also encounters kick-ass Jolie (Lois Brabin-Platt), former prostitute, later happy publican's wife, now driven crazy following the shooting of her husband Mickey (a cameo from Gray Dourdan, yes, Warrick off of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation) and loss of her unborn child.

Jeremiah and Jolie are offered a cool £1 million if they will journey to a distant island and retrieve a child, captured by a group called the New World Order, headed by a reincarnation of Satan in the body of a child molester, whose numbers include members of the Royal family. There's also some nonsense about a bunch of guardian angels called 'The Essence' from whom Jolie may be descended. Oh and did I mention that Steven Berkoff puts in an appearance, biting off large chunks of the scenery as he goes?

To get to the island they must be transported by a ferryman who can only take them if they're wearing masks (geddit?). Once there they must deal with the New World Order, whose court holds sway, doling out punishments to people for crimes of sexism and telling racist jokes; they also have to face the devil incarnate.

This inept film at least has a promising opening twenty minutes as Jolie and Jeremiah's stories intersect (poor old Crew gets some bewilderingly complicated lines with which the actor's mouth can barely keep up), but once on the island any semblance of tension (and logic) gets lost amid a mess of confused exposition, random nakedness and shouting. 

Full disclosure; this is the first of Michael's films that I've seen, and I wouldn't have reviewed this were it not for the 'Fantastic' elements. It's pretty hard to know who the audience for this would be apart from pissed blokes who like to see guns waved around and people saying "fuck" a lot. Oh and look out everybody: Michael has signed up Nicolas Cage and everyone's favourite liberal Jon Voight to star in his next outing, Heroes & Villains. Where does he come up with these titles?

Righteous Villains releases on Digital Download from 19 April 2021

The Banishing (UK 2021: Dir Chris Smith) This is the first time  Smith has returned to the fright genre since the enjoyable outward bound horror comedy Severance back in 2006. The Banishing is a more sober, and indeed sombre prospect altogether.

Set in a period in England just before the outbreak of WWII, and where the spectre of national socialism is rising in Europe, three years after a bizarre murder/suicide involving the previous occupants at Borley Rectory, Reverend Stanley Hall and his wife Beatrice, new incumbents arrive, in the shape of  former missionary Linus (John Heffernan), his new wife Marianne (Jessica Brown Findlay) and their daughter Adelaide (Anya McKenna-Bruce). Marianne is the archetypal 'fallen woman' who Linus has married, making her respectable; Adelaide's parentage is questionable, particularly as Linus seems more at home with his prayer books than in bed with his wife.

The Rectory is far too large for the family and their small retinue of servants; most of it is closed off, a fact which Marianne feels is slightly obscene in that other parts of the country are in deprivation. Wandering around the house, Adelaide finds an eyeless doll which she names Veronica and accommodates in a dolls house style facsimile of the Rectory, complete with three small brown robed figures.

In town Linus meets an odd character by the name of Harry Price (a ripe turn from Sean Harris) who warns the new vicar of the history of the Rectory and its latent power; supposedly built on the site of a monastery whose monks had some rather particular worshipping practices. In turn a higher priest, Malachi (John Lynch) warns Linus of Price's mental instability, but the audience knows that Malachi was involved in the aftermatch of Stanley and Beatrice's deaths. Gradually all three members of the family start to lose their wits, as the marital tensions between Linus and Marianne escalate. Was Price right about the house all along?

If the names 'Harry Price' and 'Marianne' ring a bell, it's because they were both pivotal in the history of Borley Rectory, a real (now demolished) house which was, reputedly, 'the most haunted house in England.' It's a story that has recently captured the imaginations of several independent filmmakers, and with various degrees of success, from prolific Welsh director Andrew Jones' 2015 outing A Haunting at the Rectory, to Ashley Thorpe's dreamy Borley Rectory (2017) and the underwhelming The Haunting of Borley Rectory by Steven M. Smith in 2019. Chris Smith's take on the story is the most sumptuous of all of them, and there's clearly some budget behind his latest feature. Cast wise he's been able to secure some real talent, from Harris' over the top, twitchy performance as Price to Heffernan's vulnerable Linus and Jessica Brown Findlay's indefatigable Marianne. 

Smith isn't beyond some genre hallmark scares; mirrors that don't behave themselves; eerie dolls; and an atmospheric soundscape which effectively evokes the isolation and age of the Rectory. He also deploys at least one scene which, if not exactly frightening, is at least very alarming. The supernatural activity in The Banshing is kept to a minimum; this is mainly a study of vulnerable people under the influence of an evil haunted house with the power to manipulate thought (and recalling both Hill House from 1963's The Haunting and The Overlook Hotel from Kubrick's 1980 The Shining). There may not be much new here, but the director certainly achieves a lot from a fairly simple premise, even if the last scene came across as far less portentous than he had maybe desired.

The Banishing will be released on digital platforms from 26 March 2021 and will stream on Shudder beginning 15 April.

DEoL Goes to FLARE 2021: Reviews of Rebel Dykes (UK/Estonia 2019), Sweetheart (UK 2021), The Obituary of Tunde Johnson (USA 2019), The Greenhouse (Australia 2021), Firebird (Estonia/UK 2021), Cowboys (USA 2020), Jump, Darling (Canada 2020), Cured (USA 2020) and Tove (Finland/Sweden 2020)

Your humble scribe is getting about a bit, albeit from the comfort of his own sofa. This year BFI's annual LGBTIQ+ Festival went online and in so doing delivered a strong line up.

Rebel Dykes (UK/Estonia 2019: Dir Harri Shanahan) As much a snapshot of gay London in the 1980s as about the shifting factions, tensions and celebrations within the various ideologies, Shanahan's documentary may have been light on authentic footage (the immediacy of events didn't really lend itself to lengthy visual records) but was made up for via a group of articulate, funny and heartlfelt interviewees that accurately situated the scene and its politics.

Commencing with the perhaps unlikely nexus of Greenham Common, where a map of the protesters' quandrants surrounding the base handily organised the women into sympathetic groups (and with the most popular area being the one closest to the pub), the documentary charts the emergence of the London club scene from bars like 'The Gateway' and 'Market Tavern' to the commencement of curated nights, organised by the nascent 'Rebel Dykes', who favoured a less passive (not to mention often highly erotic) alternative to the standard scene events. 

The intersection with punk, postpunk and art school was extremely important, and Rebel Dykes also covers the opposition experienced from groups of lesbians unhappy with the sometimes challenging stylings of the new queer scene, before everyone faced the rule of law and the infamous 'Clause 28' which, the documentary informs us, was law for a staggering 14 years. It's a fascinating watch, and provides a view of London which occupied the same time zone, if not the same spaces as other 'outsider' groups. Well worth a watch.

Sweetheart (UK 2021: Dir Marley Morrison) As the director suggests in the Q&A that followed the screening of her debut feature, holiday camps were and are a peculiarly working class institution. And the working class family at the centre of Sweetheart, headed for a much needed break, typify this. The camp for them isn't a 'staycation'; it's a holiday, and maybe the only one they'll get.

Mum Tina (Jo Hartley) has not long kicked out her drunken husband, and her older daughter Lucy (Sophia Di Martino) is heavily pregnant with her first child by anxious to please partner Steve (Samuel Anderson). But at the heart of this winning comedy drama is 17 year old April - AJ to her friends (Nell Barlow), and there aren't that many of them - who has recently come out to her family (clearly nervous around this news), and for whom a week cooped up in a chalet with everyone else is, round about now, her worst nightmare.

But a chance encounter with camp lifeguard Isla (Ella-Rae Smith) throws AJ's world into turmoil; she's instantly attracted to the employee - it's maybe the first time that she's felt this strongly about someone else - but is immediately worried that Isla is the type of girl who would naturally go with boys, and that her affections will be unreciprocated. But when Isla seems mutually attracted to AJ - whose tomboyish looks are in sharp contrast to the glamorous lifeguard - and immediately invites her to a party, a chain of events is set in train which will impact on the whole family and ensure that AJ never forgets this particular holiday.

Set in the real location of Freshwater Beach Park in Dorset, Sweetheart is a note perfect depiction of teenage misery leavened by a holiday romance, as well as an honest but ultimately redemptive story of a family coming to terms with change. Morrison wisely foregrounds AJ's lesbianism, rather than consigning her story to a narrative sidebar, and deals with the impact on the family of her coming out rather than the rather more oft travelled story of the coming out itself. An astonishing performance from newcomer Barlow as AJ, at war with herself, her family and an unjust world, is matched by Hartley's put upon Tina, a woman spinning a number of increasingly wobbly familial plates, and Smith's outwardly confident but inwardly confused Isla. 

The Obituary of Tunde Johnson (USA 2019: Dir Ali LeRoi) Tunde (Steven Silver) is the son of wealthy Nigerian parents, now resident in California. When we first meet him, he has just come out to his parents; his mother is proud, his father more wary, not for reasons of objection, but more fear for Tunde's safety. Later that evening he drives to meet boyfriend Soren (Spencer Neville) but on the way is pulled over by two cops, who escalate from low level racist taunts to full on harrasment, and then shoot him dead, believing that Tunde was reaching for a gun. Tunde wakes up, as if from a dream, and relives his last day over and over again.

Put any Groundhog Day thoughts out of your head on this one. Tunde's last day isn't relived identically, and unlike Bill Murray's Phil character in Harold Ramis' 1993 comedy; his learning through repetition isn't self improving, but more an increasing despair at how he is to be treated by the powers that be. The complexities of his relationship between Soren and their best friend Marley (Nicola Pletz) are explored from a number of different angles, as is Soren's difficulty in coming out (he and Tunde have a pact to tell their respective parents on what will be Tunde's last day). But this is really about the inescapability of fate for a black, gay man who refuses to be silent - and indeed it is only in silence that there is any hope of release.

The Obituary of Tunde Johnson is at times more than a little heavy handed, and its narrative twists don't all land, but I liked the way the movie styled itself almost as a shiny YA drama (complete with age appropriate soundtrack) and then proceeded to peel away the apparent superficiality. There's no denying the power of the piece, and Silver delivers a great performance as the increasingly trapped and angry Tunde. LeRoi has, it seems, largely successfully made the transition from TV to feature length movies with this debut.

The Greenhouse (Australia 2021: Dir Thomas Wilson-White) Beth Tweedy-Bell (Jane Watt) lives with her mother; she originally had two mothers ('the mums' as they were affectionately known) but one, Lillian (Rhondda Findleton) died several years previously. Her surviving mother, Ruth (Camilla Ah Kin) is preparing for her 60th birthday party, and the rest of the Tweedy-Bell's are headed back home to celebrate.

The family are still mired in grief, although Beth and Ruth seem hardest hit: Beth has remained in the house after Lillian's death, a request from her dying mother being to help Ruth. Beth is also dealing with her own sexuality; a relationship with a friend Lauren (Harriet Gordon-Anderson) broke down because of Beth's unwillingness to confront her own gayness. As the family return, one night Beth experiences something equally strange and profound; beyond the garden of the house exists a doorway to her past. She is able to silently observe happy family scenes before her brothers and sisters left home, an extended vision where Lillian is still alive. Ruth's fragile mental health sees her returning again and again to this dream land of memory, but the comfort of the extended vision draws her further and further away from her own personal crisis.

Wilson-White's debut feature is an intensely personal film that asks the audience to take a massive leap of faith in believing that Beth's encountered world of the past is more than the heightened memories of a grief stricken woman. The early scenes where she walks into a wall of smoke/cloud only to emerge in the greenhouse of her family house some years earlier reminded me of the 1972 dreamy timeslip children's movie The Amazing Mr Blunden. But whereas a more sci fi based telling of the story might have taken us down the 'fix the past and change the future' plot standby, Wilson-White's version has the alternative time as a MacGuffin for the triggering of memory and loss (maddeningly some of the laws of the alternate reality, evident in the film, remain unexplained).

Ultimately The Greenhouse is more sad than profound, but the ensemble playing of the extended family (a mix of natural and adopted members) is convincing, and the feeling of shared loss palpable. My other quibble is that the Beth role seemed very under-written, considering she is the glue that holds the story together. But this is a first feature, filmed in rather challenging circumstances, and I hope Wilson-White is able to make another film at some point.

Firebird (Estonia/UK 2021: Dir Peeter Rebane) Based on a true story, Reban's debut feature is the tale of Sergey, carrying out his military service at an air force in Russian controlled Estonia during the 1970s. Life is hard but made easier by his friendship with others including Luisa (Diana Pozharskaya) and the fact that after his term of service he intends to pursue a career as an actor. However when fighter pilot Roman (Oleg Zagorodnii) arrives at the base, for Sergey it's love at first sight, and it isn't long before Sergey's attraction is reciprocated. Unsurprisingly, same sex relationships under Russian rule in the 1970s could lead to extended prison sentences...or worse (the fact that these laws, once relaxed, have been reinstated in the country is recorded in the end credits).

The most remarkable aspect of Firebird is its narrative and temporal sweep; the film charts Sergey and Roman's difficult relationship path, and the characters who become involved in it, as well as the looming threat of conflict between east and west, in a way which few debut films have achieved. There is a confidence about Rebane's direction that co-ordinates the movie's different elements into a satisfying drama, from large crowd scenes to moments of intimacy. However, perhaps as a by-product of this, the threat of danger inherent in the soldiers' relationship seems to have become lost; it was almost as if Firebird was aiming not to offend, and the decision for the mixed nationality cast to speak in English further muted the drama of the piece, despite some strong performances (particularly from Pozharskaya and Zagorodnii). This is still a very fine movie and a very watchable one, but I could have done with more intensity and less grandeur.

Cowboys (USA 2020: Dir Anna Kerrigan) Troy (Steve Zahn) and his young transgender son Joe (played by Sasha Wright) are headed out on a roadtrip. Based in Montana (the movie was filmed in the state's Flathead National Park), they're aiming for Canada. But just as they're getting going, Troy's truck breaks down and, taking advantage of a friend, Bob (Gary Farmer), he and Joe trade the faulty vehicle for Bob's horse and resume their journey.

How Troy and Joe got to this position is told in a series of carefully arranged flashbacks, interspersed between the police's efforts to track the pair with the help of Troy's ex-wife Sally (Jillian Bell). Troy and Sally's marriage, and eventual separation, was in greater part due to Troy's acute mental health issues, controlled by medication, and their child's emerging understanding that their daughter Josie identfied as a boy. Joe's version of what a boy should be has been fashioned largely on Troy, a dreamer who sees himself in the mould of a cowboy, and Troy's plaid wearing friends. Troy was the obvious choice for Joe to declare his identity to, and is supportive, in contrast to Sally whose dismissal of Joe's news is more likely because of concerns for her child as much as an inability to understand the position. "Who would choose to be a girl?" she asks, incredulously, at one point.

But when an incident involving Sally's brother lands Troy in prison, Sally uses the time to discourage Joe from seeing himself as a boy; Troy's release causes further tensions. "You messed her up!" she yells at her husband, from whom she in now separated, and shortly afterwards, he has kidnapped Joe on one of his access days. The pair's trek across country, initially a welcome adventure, becomes more problematic after Troy loses his medication and becomes increasingly manic.

This superb drama centres around three note perfect, complex performances from Zahn, Bell and above all Sasha Wright, whose confusion and determination frequently present him as the strongest and most capable character of the three of them. Setting the story in a rural community where gender roles remain unquestioned adds an extra layer to the story (although a final, redemptive scene offers an easier ride for Joe than maybe some other films would offer), and the wide expanses of the Montana countryside present a beautiful but desolate backdrop to events. This is a powerful yet subtle film which, as a debut feature, is incredibly imprressive.

Jump, Darling (Canada 2020: Dir Phil Connell) Connell's debut feature (and Flare is to be praised for the sheer number of first timer movies shown at the Festival) is a low key study of identity, loss and family. Thomas Duplessie plays Russell, who has just split up with his boyfriend Justin (Andrew Bushell), ostensibly because of artistic differences; Russell is an aspiring but unhappy actor making ends meet as a drag artist (going by the name of 'Fishy Falters'), resulting in him being drunk on the job in the bar in which he works and fleeing town. His problems may also have arisen, via an observation offered by his mother Ene (Linda Kash) when trying to track him down, that stuffy Justin was ashamed to admit his boyfriend's occupation in front of his well to do friends.

Russell heads for a place he feels will be safe; the house belonging to his grandmother Margaret (Cloris Leachman). Margaret is a stubborn, independent woman reaching the end of her life (it's quite difficult to separate out the character from the notoriously caustic actress, who sadly died not long after the film wrapped, aged 94) and with memory loss. Russell's plan is for a quick stopover, just long enough to acquire grandma's unused car and write himself a cheque. But something gets in the way of this - whether selfishness or a genuine wish to re-connect with Margaret - and he stays; instead he seeks out the only gay bar in the neighbourhood, and gets a job DJing and resuming his drag act, in which he finds confidence and freedom of expression. Russell's arrival has an energising effect on Margaret, and is a timely one because he's in the right place to help gran fight off his mother's plan to commit Margaret to a nursing home.

Little happens in Jump, Darling but that's ok; this is essentially a story of two people from different generations learning from each other, Margaret dealing with the sadness in her life which Russell helps her address, and her grandson picking up some life lessons in return. Many have described this as a 'feelgood' film and while its conclusion is optimistic the journey is at times sad and poignant, leavened by some exceptional dance scenes (real-life drag stars Fay Slift, Miss Fiercealicious and Canada’s 'Drag Race' contestant Tynomi Banks turn up; apparently they helped Duplessie get into character, and they were pretty successful as he's fabulous onstage) and a superb soundtrack.

Cured (USA 2020: Dir Patrick Sammon, Bennett Singer) If recent events in American history have taught us that bigotry is alive and well in the US of A, not least among the rank and file Trump voting Republican masses, this sobering documentary details exactly what happens when that oppressive narrow- mindeness is invested in a powerful US institution; in this case the American Psychiatric Associaton (APA).

Starting from the Freudian premise that homosexuality was a 'learned' behaviour rather than something that either 'is' or 'isn't', Cured begins with a selection of 1950s think pieces and tabloid speculation about the gay threat and the abnormality of homosexuality, attitudes unerwritten by the APA’s 'Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders', first published in 1952, which listed homosexuality as a 'sociopathic personality disturbance' in its first edition, and later as a 'sexual deviation' and 'non-psychotic mental disorder.' The by now infamous footage of Electro Shock Therapy being administed as a course of treatment for such patients is a shocking as the credence given to the psychiatrists at their conferences as they delivered paper after paper on the identification and treatment of gay men, lesbians and trans people, without a shred of empiric evidence.

And it's into this organisation that opposition was first voiced, courtesy of a group who took on the psychiatrists in the most public way possible; by taking the stage at their conventions and literally grabbing both the microphones, and later the headlines. Cured charts the slow, incremental fight to secure patronage of sympathetic shrinks (led by Dr John Freyer who initially addressed his opposers wearing a mask for anonymity), leading to the legal challenge to have 'homosexuality' removed from the list of mental disorders; that eventual victory resulted in millions of people being wiped off the list and, ironically, 'cured.'

Like all great stories about activism, the documentary concentrates on a handful of willful and tenacious protestors who acted as a small beacon of common sense in a sea of reactionary and oppressive pseudo science; their accounts are equally brave and good humoured, and the rise of activism behind and around them life affirming. Not only is this a well constructed documentary, it's also a timely one, if only that that some of the personalities involved are already no longer with us: Cured stands both as an important document and an engrossing slice of modern American history.

Tove (Finland/Sweden 2020: Dir Zaida Bergroth) It's impossible to overestimate the cultural impact that artist and writer Tove Jansson (who died nearly twenty years ago) had on her native Finland, so it's understandable why director Zaida Bergroth took a fairly careful approach in her depiction of one part of Jansson's life.

We are introduced to the artist (played by established stage actress Alma Pöysti) via the relationship with her father, the renowned sculptor Viktor Jansson (Robert EncKell) and his strong feelings about the childishness of her doodles (which of course would go on to form the Moomin family) and requirement for her to paint, not draw, and to produce landscapes rather than portraits. Tove's oscillation between the two artforms causes her great unhappiness, not to mention a life of near destitution. A relationship with aspiring politician Atos Wirtanen (Shanto Roney) suggests the possibility of future stability, but a suprise commission from an upper class client, actress and stage director Vivica Bandler (Krista Kosonen) triggers her artistic and romantic future. As Bergroth depicts it, the relationship between the two women falters pretty quickly because of both the class difference and Vivica's infidelities, and the artist's fallback, getting married hurriedly to Atos who has himself divorced to be with Tove, is also short lived.

Tove's free spirit, captured during scenes of her dancing by herself with wild abandon, seems forever neutered when partnered with others. And indeed 'neutered' seems an appropriate word for the whole film. Tove looks gorgeous (I haven't seen a production design like it since Paul Thomas Anderson's 2017 movie Phantom Thread, with which it shares a similar artisitc/obesseive feel) but I'm not sure I learned much about the artist; it's almost as if Bergroth were politely hovering over the details of the artist's life, giving just enough to warrant casual interest but unwilling to dwell on any details. It's worth seeing for Pöysti's performance, but I could have done with a lot more rawness.

DEoL goes to Wales One World Film Festival!

The Wales One World Festival (WOW for short) is a small festival from Wales, now amazingly in its 20th year, and like many such events over the last twelve months has reorganised itself online, and free too. The programmers' mission is to "curate eye-opening world cinema so you can experience the weird, wild, wonderful world we live in." DEoL dug in a for a sample of their wares:

Arab Blues aka Un divan à Tunis (France/Tunisia 2019: Dir Manele Labidi) By no means the subtlest film you'll see all year, French director Labidi's debut feature is the story of Selma (Golshifteh Farahani) who returns from Paris to her native Tunisia to set up a psychotherapy service in the rooms above her rather indifferent aunt and uncle's apartments. The locals, focused around larger than life hairdresser Baya (the brilliant Feryel Chammari), are suspicious of Selma's motives in returning and dismissive of the need for a therapist in their midst.

But, and with a portrait of her beloved Freud staring down from the wall, Selma gradually builds up a clientele of townsfolk keen to unload their stresses (including Baya who, surprise surprise, has 'mother' issues) and running the gamut of stereotypical 'subjects,' including the guy with a love of women's clothing and the paranoid conspiracy theorist. All's going well until local cop Naim (Majd Mastoura) asks to see her Tunisian license to practice.

Arab Blues finds its humour in the subverting of the country's taboos, not least the strong, defiantly single Selma, who wears what she likes and smokes when she likes, inviting first disdain and then adoration from the womenfolk. The character based humour is very broad but the array of Selma's subjects contrasts with, and slightly overshadows, a rather subdued performance from Farhani (so good in Jim Jarmusch's 2016 movie Paterson) as the therapist determined to ply her trade no matter what the setback.

The Long Walk aka Bor Mi Vanh Chark (Laos 2019: Dir Mattie Do) Do was raised in Los Angeles but returned to Laos about ten years ago, and has since made three films there, that fuse legend, magic and mystery.

The Long Walk is part sci fi, part time travel and part ghost story, suffused with the rituals and beliefs of Laos culture. It's the story of an older man (Yannawoutthi Chanthalungs) living in a Laos of the near future (signified by supersonic jets flying overhead and payment systems that interact with a chip under the skin), who scavenges motorcycle parts to get by. He was the last person to see a missing woman alive, the latest in a string of absences that suggest the activities of a serial killer. But the old guy has a gift; supposedly he can speak to the dead, and is approached by the missing woman's daughter for this purpose. 

In a (n apparently) separate story, a young boy (Por Silatsa) lives with his ill mother and angry, drunken father on their farm, and has his first encounter with death when he finds the body of a woman in the undergrowth. At the same time he befriends a mysterious, silent girl (Noutnapha Soydara) and from her learns to navigate the myseries of life and death.

How these two stories interconnect is the intruiging heart of the movie; any precise explanation of events is denied (in a Q&A Do revealed that even she and her writer husband Christopher Larson disagreed on the interpretation) but although The Long Walk is an enigmatic piece it's far from an incoherent one, with some intense performances and a real sense of the country's recent history unfolding as the lives of the characters progress. Well worth a rewatch for the small details as well as the universality of the story.

Les Saignantes aka The Bloodettes (Cameroon 2005: Dir Jeanne-Pierre Bekolo) Set in 2025, which would have seemed a lot more of a way off than its screening this year, Bekolo's work is best seen as an early example of Afrofuturism. Two friends, Majoulie (Adèle Ado) and Chouchou (Dorylia Calmel), are adventurists and sort of prostitutes on the mean streets of Cameroon. Trying as always to make a quick buck, Majoulie kills the Secretary General of the Civil Cabinet during (literally) acrobatic sex. In an attempt to hide the body the pair end up with the head only, and must try and secure a body to match before the state funeral.

Woefully cheap, and shot on video making it look even more threadbare, the 'futuristic' elements seem to be confined to a self driving car, but there's also a sense of magic in the ever present, but unexplained force of Mevoungou, which dictates the fates of all involved. Majoulie and Chochou come over like a Cameroon version of Celine and Julie from Jacques Rivette's 1974 film Celine and Julie Go Boating; they move in and around the corruption of the country, bribing police officers and laughing their way out of trouble. It's a pretty scrappy film which apparently fell foul of the authorities, and thus is still of some cultural interest.

Scales aka Sayyedat al-Bahr (Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Iraq 2019: Dir Shahad Ameen) Ameen's debut feature, which builds on the themes of her 2013 short Eye & Mermaid, screened at the BFI London Film Festival back in 2019. It draws on folk tales and myth which Ameen uses as a jumping off point for a study of identity and gender.

On a barren island, villagers must, as a time honoured ritual, sacrifice one of their daughters to the sea and the creatures that live under the waves. But one of the babies, Hayat, is rescued by her father. 12 years later Hayat is a largely shunned girl, ostracised for being rescued when she should have been sacrificed. The men of the island regularly harvest mermaids from the sea, and as Hayat watches, she sees scales forming on her legs. She also hears cries emananting from the water; are they calling her?

When Hayat's mother falls pregnant again, she hopes for a respite, but the child is male. "This is no place for girls" she is told: her place is to give herself to the sea. At the next full moon Hayat is asked to sacrifice herself; the sea claims her but she makes her escape again, proving her increasing strength to the fishermen by dragging a mermaid up from the beach and killing it. While she's now free to move among the watchful males, literally learning the ropes, Hayat chooses her own path.

Scales has autobiographical elements but also mythical ones (in Arabic mythology the mermaid is seen as the goddess of fertility but also assocated with suicide and preserved beauty). Ameen wisely avoids a more traditional story of a girl recognising the power of her own female-ness by setting her film in an unspecified time and with nature and humanity sharing equal screen space. The lush black and white photography of João Ribeiro creates a harsh but lyrical backdop to the film, and as Hayat Basima Hajjar is quietly enigmatic. This is a slow, contemplative film with a quiet power.

Roh aka Soul (Malaysia 2019: Dir Emir Ezwan) Another debut feature, this time from Kuala Lumpur based Ezwan, which like the other films seen at this Festival digs deep into the country's Muslim beliefs for the source of its wonder and horror.

Mother Mak (Farah Ahmed) lives in the jungle with her two children, son Angah (Harith Haziq) and daughter Along (Mhia Farhana). While out checking traps for potential food, the children happen upon a dead deer, suspended from a tree. This is the first of a number of omens which befall the family. Elsewhere a bedraggled girl, tiny and silent, wanders the forest and turns up at the family's home. Mak takes pity on her but the girl is resistant to their care, and shockingly cuts her own throat after delivering her only speech, a warning about the impending doom facing mother and children.

A strange old lady called Tok (June Lojong) appears, collecting plants, and talking of bad omens. Elsewhere a man, similarly dishevelled, is looking for his daughter: it is the same girl who slit her throat. Along has an odd encounter in the forest and falls ill; Tok feels she can cast a spell to make her better, but Mak feels, quite rightly, that events are spiralling out of control. "Someting evil has entered this area," Tok says. 

While there's no denying that Ezwan's feature piles on the tension and is packed with atmosphere, I was perhaps looking for something a little more than a succession of scenes with harbingers of doom, worried faces and dense jungle scenery. Individual scenes hold great power: the opening sequence, showing the silent young girl, blood matted and holding a knife in front of a ferocious fire, packs a punch, and Along's 'possessed'' behaviour is occasionally terrifying. But taken as a whole there wasn't much for me beyond an overall mood. Haziq, Farhana and Ahmed are all excellent in their roles, and Saifuddin Musah's cinematography is frequently stunning. It's an impressive film, just not an overly satifying one.

The Toll (UK 2021: Dir Ryan Andrew Hooper) Hooper's debut feature is clearly inbebted, both in structure and tone, to the earlier films of Martin McDonagh. A namless isolated tollboth operator (Michael Smiley) becomes the fulcrum for a series of sub-plots involving a variety of quirky characters, including triplet female terrorists (all played by Gwyneth Keyworth) and a female Elvis impersonator called Dixie (Evelyn Mok), who may or may not be linked to Smiley's dark past. Law enforcement comes courtesy of Catrin (Annes Elwy), a young police officer who, when we first meet her, is pointing a speeding gun at passing motorists next to a sign that reads 'SLOWN DOWN - 1 casualty in 1 year on this road.' Catrin's job, like the audience's, is to piece together the fractured narrative delivered to her by Smiley and to us by director Hooper.

There's a lot of incidental humour via character mortivations, and some wry observations of small town Welsh life which, in a non Welsh director's hands, may have come across more dodgily than they do here. Ultimately this is Smiley's movie; he doesn't have to do much and, as in many of his movies, the action revolves aroung his rather taciturn but not unemotional performance. I can't help feeling that I've seen this sort of thing done better elsewhere; its pleasure is perhaps in its small cast and restricted locations, but it didn't really resonate with me either as a comedy or a narrative to be pieced together.

The Winter Lake (Ireland/Canada 2019: Dir Phil Sheerin)

Elaine (Charlie Murphy) and her errant teenage son Tom (Anson Boon) have fled to Ireland - and Elaine's great grandfather's house - to escape an incident where Tom assaulted someone with a knife.

Elaine understandably blames her son for having to uproot the family and occupy a cold draughty house in the middle of nowhere. Tom, a taciturn, self-contained figure, explores the local area while his mum is in town trying to sort out single parent benefits. While digging around in a pond, he discovers something so shocking that he scoops it up and takes it home; it is the skeleton of a baby.

In town, and with her car failing to start, Elaine meets a helpful guy who turns out to be their next door neighbour. He is Ward (Michael McElhatton) who also has a teenager; daughter Holly (Emma Mackey). The forthright Holly instantly makes Tom feel awkward, even though they're broadly the same age, compounded by her assessment that Elaine is making the moves on her dad.

Village lad Col (Mark McKenna) who clearly has some history with Holly, takes an instant dislike to Tom, and the feeling is mutual, leading to an incident where Tom attacks Col and becomes a marked man in the village. But that's the least of his problems, when he finds out the truth about the skeleton and is asked to assist in an act of revenge.

It's perhaps not hard to see where the story of The Winter Lake is heading, bearing in mind its small cast and increasingly nihilistic atmosphere. The movie's setting is definitely case of the 'the harmony of scene and situation'; the backdrop is Irish rain, miserable roadside cafes and empty amusement arcades. So while's there's no denying that the film looks and feels authentically gloomy, unfortunately the story feels too flimsy to contain the weight of the mis en scene. 

Boon is convincingly angst ridden as the troubled Tom, but Murphy remains unfocussed as put upon mum Elaine, and McElhatton has perhaps rather too much of the pantomime villain about him; it's left to Sex Education's Emma Mackey to carry the piece, but it's not really enough. Sheerin's debut feature shows up much of his training in short films - small details represent broader themes - but overall it's light in content, and what remains is a feeling of misery in search of a convincing narrative.