The Hallow - Movie Review

What do you get when you take a healthy dose of Celtic mythology, postpartum depression, and add a sprinkling of xenophobia?

No, not a new stereotypical Guillermo del Toro film, but something that feels incredibly fresh and daring.

Let’s discuss.

The Hallow is a creature-feature horror film brought to us by writer/director Corin Hardy.

Wait, why are you getting up?!

Don’t leave, I mean I know he directed The Nun, but you can’t hold that against him forever. The Conjuring Universe has sucked many successful directors into its depths.

Prior to directing films, Hardy was the hottest music video directors in the industry. I find that music video directors who transition to genre work almost always succeed in delivering spectacle. The best example I can give is Antoine Fuqua, the OG badass music video director who broke into film with the fantastic The Replacement Killers. I think music video directors have an edge over traditional film school graduates. Music video directors are also, in many cases, the production designer, special effects supervisor, and lighting designer all in one. They are about telling a story visually as opposed to crushing the audience with heavy handed exposition. The Hallow is a perfect example of how this is a boon to a horror film.

The film centers on British conservationist / biologist Adam. Who, along with his wife and baby son, is sent to the backwoods of Ireland to survey are stretch of woodlands that are due for development. Their arrival is met with derision by the locals. They are harassed on a daily basis by local farmer Colm Donnelly and his paranoia about the woods. His threatens Adam and his wife Clare to leave or face the repercussions. What they write off as madness quickly begins to become reality. After dark the woods come alive and odd things begin to happen. Footsteps on the roof, broken windows, and screams unnerve the family and that’s just the beginning. They were warned of the Hallow and it’s denizens, but they didn’t listen. Now as the night seems ever long, can the family survive until the dawn? Find out in The Hallow.

It’s a basic premise, but basic isn’t a negative if you nail it.

Surprise—they nailed it.

How? you might ask.

Well sir/madame/non-binary, you’ve come to the right place.

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If you do anything safe or basic in your industry whether it be culinary, artistic, or business related—it better be perfect. Often times it’s harder to succeed with the safe option because it’s been done to death and the expectations of turning something in that’s safe is that it is going to be flawless in every way. There’s not often WOW factor in the safe option.

But, there were multiple times in this film where I was dumbstruck by the path this film took. At first glance, this film may appear to be a straight forward xenophobic thriller, and that’s how the first thirty minutes goes. It sets up the unhinged neighbor trope and gives you the feeling that the Police and the town as a whole are out to get our protagonist. I actually bought into this, but it was a red herring to set-up the first Oh SHIT moments in the film. The reveal of the Fae folk that reside within the Hallow realm.

Time Out.

So, I went into this film being extensively educated on the myths and folklore of Ireland as it is my wife’s favorite subject of study. She has pounded as much Celtic mythology into my brain that all of the Easter eggs in the beginning of the film were obvious for me. I feel like this might have ruined the film for me opposed to someone going in blind to the folklore. The film does a great, quick job of educating the viewer, but for me it was all reruns. Here’s the rundown:

In Celtic mythology, Fairies are nasty pieces of work. Picture Oberon and Titania from Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, but make them cannibalistic, rapey root monsters and you’ll be on the right track. You don’t piss of the woodland creatures because if they don’t rape you, eat you, or kill you… they take over your mind. You’ve seen the essence of these creatures all throughout American horror. Look no further than Evil Dead’s infamous root rape scene, or the recent changeling horror film The Hole in the Ground.

As soon as they started mentioning the Fae creatures I got the feeling that the Xenophobic bent was just a distraction tactic. It was a good one, especially with the crazy neighbor being played by prolific television actor Michael McElhatton. I know the name doesn’t sound familiar, but you’ll know his voice and his face. He’s probably best known for playing Roose Bolton on Game of Thrones, but for those of you who, like me, didn’t care about Game of Thrones, he was also a regular on great shows like The Alienist and The Fall. He just exudes bad guy pheromones, but he infuses it with a hardedge kindness. As you find out in the end of the film, he isn’t a bad guy. He just doesn’t want Adam’s family to experience the horror his family went through in years previous. The only way he can think to convince them is menace.

Then again, once you meet our protagonist Adam, you’ll see why that was the only option. Adam is the guy from high school who was bullied at home and away. He grew up with a chip on his shoulder and he likes to flash it all around. This led to him believe he’s always right—about everything. It also led to him being a right coward about interpersonal interactions. After our crazy neighbor Colm, invades Adam’s house and terrifies his wife TWICE, Adam refuses to go talk to him.

I can’t stress enough how much this pissed me off. My wife was once stalked by a weirdo at her place of employment. He was just a creeper who made comments that made her and her friends uncomfortable. I went to her work and found this guy in the parking lot and I made sure he never talked to my wife again. It’s part of the gig. I believe men are meant to protect women and children. It doesn’t matter if that woman is gay or straight, black or white. If another man or outside force is threatening violence against a woman in any capacity, it is our duty to take the bullets if need be. Much more if it’s your loved one.

Please don’t take this as an anti-feminist statement. I was raised in a family where my mother was the only working parent and was a proto-feminist. We lived hand to mouth due to the wage gap, so don’t @me.

I feel like the filmmakers were on the same page as my philosophy here. Adam’s behavior is supposed to upset you. He’s a dick. He puts his family at risk multiple times in the beginning moments of the film. From taking his infant son into the deep woods and exposing him to the obvious danger of fungal spores from a rare, deadly strain to abandoning his wife multiple times when crazy neighbors are about. It’s just mind boggling, until you realize what the film is truly about.

To me, Adam’s behavior is familiar to my own actions after the birth of my daughter. Postpartum depression isn’t only an issue for the mother. To be 100% honest, I didn’t know this until I experienced the effects firsthand. Having experienced the loss of our first child to a miscarriage and being stuck in a horrible job with a military insurance provider that, at the time didn’t paternity leave, and had mandatory overtime every single night. I often left home prior to my daughter waking up and would arrive home late at night after she’d already been put to bed. I rarely saw my daughter in her first year of life and due to that a rift developed. I felt like a horrible father and husband, I felt like my daughter hated me because she didn’t like me to hold her or feed her. That teamed with the lack of sleep from the extended workday and having newborn in the house was an awful cocktail. Then there’s the lack of intimacy that’s natural post pregnancy. You feel unwanted by default.

Men are simple creatures. A lot of our confidence is derived from the attention we receive from our significant other. Sex is the biggest confidence booster there is.

Hardy’s direction here is so subtle and the non-verbal storytelling gives us all the signs that the post-pregnancy stress has set in and there’s a divide in the household. Not only did they just have a new baby, Adam was dispatched on a huge job for a land developer far from home. He’s good at what he does and loves his work, but often at the cost of family interaction. He’s an introvert that prefers plants to humans.

I can’t blame him, but at the same time…his wife is played by the drop dead gorgeous Bojana Novakovic. How could you not give a woman that looks as flawless as that more attention?

Oof.

Both actors give heart wrenching performances. Novakovic as Clare hits the almost “too real” performance level. I was worried the actors may have experienced Cannibal Holocaust levels of brutal filmmaking, but no, they’re just amazing performers.

There’s so much that happens in this film that had me applauding, especially when it came to the effects work. This isn’t a huge budget production. It’s a joint British/Ireland venture, but it was obvious money was tight. This is when a lot of films blow what little budget they have for effects on low-rent cgi. This isn’t the case here. John Nolan’s special effects studio handled the creatures and as always, they nailed it.

John Nolan’s studio has handled films like The Brother’s Grimm, Guns Akimbo, and Hellboy II: The Golden Army. They are well-respected for creature design and animatronics. They pulled out all the tricks here. As someone who did special effects for theater and for screen, I can’t tell you how happy I was to see old-school trapdoor spots with more upscale prosthetics. The artists who worked on this film used everything including the kitchen sink. The practical effects are standout. Even the limited CGI works for the most part. It’s obvious budget constraints kept them handcuffed, but they did the best with what they had. The lighting in this film is incredible as well. The lighting fills in so many gaps in budget as the darkness itself is used as a character.

Just when I think the film can’t get any better, it dives into druidic body horror. I didn’t anticipate Adam morphing into a Green Man, but by god did I just out of my chair when it happened. He looks fucking incredible especially when he lights up the flaming scythe.

You need to watch this film.

I hear so many people complain about remakes, reboots, and no original ideas being put to film anymore.

Yet, when something like this comes out it gets shunned because it doesn’t have blockbuster actors.

See this movie.

It’s great.

Watch The Hallow if you like creature features, body horror, or if you are scared of the woods.

You won’t be disappointed.

The Hallow is streaming on Shudder as of this writing.

Follower Requested Review received from Michael Proffitt @popeminja on Instagram - If you have a film you’d like me to check out, DM me on Instagram @filthyhorrorsdotcom