Paul Duane is the film-maker who in 2011 made Barbaric Genius, a gripping documentary portrait of ex-convict, ex-vagrant and match chess participant John Healy, whose memoir The Grass Area is a traditional of outsider artwork literature. Now Duane has given us this horror movie which, although it begins with attention-grabbing subversive and satirical concepts, and an attention-grabbing allusion to Guillermo del Toro, lastly turns into, for me, just too chaotic, strained and unfocused.
Anna (Simone Collins) and Aleks (Charlie Maher) are social historians who journey round distant rural pubs in Eire, recording people ballads; they change into fascinated by rumours of an previous lady who lives thereabouts who can sing a thousand-year-old music, taught over generations from mom to daughter, which has by no means been recorded or transcribed on paper. Asking questions on her makes locals suspicious; Anna and Aleks guarantee one man that they don’t seem to be journalists or serious about something “political”, however he replies darkly: “There’s nothing that’s not political …”
He’s proper. The act of recording an Indigenous or vernacular tradition for outsider consumption – and thereby encouraging outsider curiosity and intervention – has social and political implications. However for them, the implications go additional. The music is taboo, setting it down is a transgression, and uncovering this tortured people ballad of ageless ache and rage has summoned up forces of evil. It’s a good suggestion and there are good moments within the movie, particularly on the very starting when Anna and Aleks have a weird encounter with the previous lady herself, Rita Concannon, strikingly performed by Olwen Fouéré. However then issues start to slip. There are nonetheless some resonant concepts right here.
