Relic (2020)- BFI London Film Festival 2020

Review

89min

Genre:       Drama, Horror, Thriller

Director:     Natalie Erika James

Cast:         Robyn Nevin, Emily Mortimer, Bella Heathcote…and more

Writers:     Natalie Erika James and Christian White

-Synopsis-

An Aussie grandmother’s inexplicable disappearance becomes even more bizarre when she returns a changed figure, plunging her daughter and granddaughter into despair when they lose touch with a matriarch in psychological decline, while the decaying family home begins to reveal insidious secrets which may hold the key to this mystery . . . but threatens to consume them all.

Since the early days of “Ozploitation” during the 70s New Wave of Australian cinema, the unforgiving outback and dusty roads in the ‘Land Down Under’ have proven fertile grounds for Aussie horror, as the terror moved into the suburbs and the cities, with Jennifer Kent then taking it into our homes like never before with 2014’s ‘The Babadook’. Now Melbourne-based American debutante writer/director Natalie Erika James takes inspiration from Kent as well as Asian horror’s penchant for dark parables about family drama and mental decline—creating her own take on the haunted house horror and an unsettling metaphor for dementia which gives new meaning to the phrase ‘home is where the heart is’.

Emily Mortimer stars as middle-aged Melburnian ‘Kay’, who reunites with her estranged twentysomething daughter ‘Sam’ (Bella Heathcote) and returns to her rural childhood small-town home when her increasingly forgetful elderly mother ‘Edna’ (Robyn Nevin) inexplicably goes missing. But things begin to take an ominous turn when grandma mysteriously re-appears a changed figure, as her behaviour turns increasingly bizarre and she slowly becomes a paranoid stranger to her descendants, while their family home crumbles into a bleak husk of the past which threatens to deal them a foreboding fate.

Set in a chilly Victoria and a rural suburban southern Australian winter, ‘Relic’ adds to a 21^st century tradition of slow-burn, cerebral and emotional substantial horror which has irked some horror ‘purists’ over the last decade or so, as no doubt this will too. As such Erika James foregoes instant frights and immediate terror for a creepiness and dread which builds with foreboding menace, plus a hint of mystery, unsettling the audience and leading them to a summit of horror and a macabre but cathartic finale, although less gratifying than you might expect . . . or want.

That’s not to say that ‘Relic’ is devoid of horror, or indeed the odd traditional scare, and it positively drips with atmosphere, as composer Brian Reitzell (Stranger Than Fiction, Kicks) sets the mood with a deeply unsettling and occasionally jarring score with echoes of Trent Reznor, seamlessly blended with the film’s pulsating sound design.

Meanwhile emerging cinematographer Charlie Sarroff gradually turns down the brightness to reflect the increasingly dire tone of the film, while a combination of practical and subtle digital effects see a creeping black mould of death begin to corrupt the house and its inhabitants, as James underlines the film’s tagline with a bleak visual metaphor for the decay of all things. It brings to life a subtle supernatural element which is a part of the real world in the story while simultaneously both a reflection and manifestation of Edna’s state of mind. And it’s all contained by a perfectly charming and homely suburban family home which transforms into an increasingly bleak and labyrinthine prison—thanks to sterling production designs—threatening to entomb generations of this family, again a visual metaphor for degenerative a condition but with the added threat of hereditary genetics.

This is also something of a family drama and a female generational character tale, and to a large extent a three-hander chambre piece too, and so the weight of the film’s drama falls on the shoulders of three leads who carry it admirably and in tune with their characters. Heathcote as the youngest and most perceptive who empathises with her beloved gran but quickly clocks something seriously wrong with her, Mortimer as her wistful and worrying mother who takes on the responsibility of her own mother’s predicament while dreading what it means for all of them, and Nevin who steals the show as the degenerating and increasingly paranoid granny who struggles to recognise friend from foe. Both a frightening visual manifestation of dementia and a victim of it, who adds plenty to the established canon of creepy old ladies in horror films.

Ultimately there’s nothing here, or anywhere else for that matter, scarier than the film’s central theme—dementia. With Natalie Erika James framing the condition, be it Alzheimer’s or any other variant, as a tangible, supernatural demon or invader who takes over those we know and love, slowly turning them into someone or something alien and terrifying—which makes ‘Relic’ a dark parable about letting go of a person we once knew, to learn how to love who’ve they become.

But the reality and prevalence of the syndrome is more frightening than any horror film could allegorise, and ‘Relic’ only serves as a vivid reminder of what this unstoppable monster really is. Something which gradually rips away everything which makes a person themselves, devastating those around them and robbing people of their loved ones, while keeping them physically in this world feeling alone and trapped in their bodies . . . and awaiting death.

It is fair to say that despite its many moody merits, ‘Relic’ is far from an instant indie horror classic. It’s not as intricate, affecting or clever as some of the more memorable efforts in the recent new wave of horror typified by filmmakers like Ari Aster, Jordan Peele and Jennifer Kent over the last decade or so, nor is it as terrifying or instantly gratifying as more traditional and classic examples of the genre. But Natalie Erika James’ debut effort is undoubtedly a skilled and impressive meditation on a theme, and a dark deconstruction of the human condition which bathes in gloriously grim atmosphere while unsettling the audience and keeping us gripped throughout—and it’s a refreshing departure from much of the prolific and impersonal cookie-cutter horror fare out there.

The Bottom Line…

A tense and claustrophobic meditation on dementia and the horrors of decay and death, Natalie Erika James’ debut stylishly blends creepy and unsettling if not quite terrifying haunted house horror with confronting family drama to test your nerves and leave you contemplating your own decline. Making sure you will never look at mould and damp in your house the same way again.

‘Relic’ is out now in the US, and on the 30th of October in the UK.

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