Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020
Images from the Internet
This is the second of a three-part
review series of the films of Yolanda Torres. They will be in chronological
order, over three days. These films were also written by Joan Alvarez.
The Forsaken
Directed by Yolanda Torres
aFilm International Film Workshop; Easy Stiges
86 minutes, 2015 / 2020
www.easystiges.com
Tales of kidnapping
for ransom gone awry are certainly not new. Even back in 1907, short story
maven O. Henry wrote an iconic one with a comic bent called “The Ransom of Red
Chief,” for example.
Of course, this account
takes itself quite a bit more seriously, if not with a profound sinister and
possible supernatural tone. Five British and Spanish kidnappers for hire, with
Tarantino-eque names like Mr. Blake, Mr. Quartermass, Mrs. Peel (who wears
tight leather pants; what, no Mr. Steed?) and Number Two (Alberto Esparza),
have grabbed schoolgirl Sara (Claudia Trujillo playing younger than her years,
but looks well in the part) under the orders of an unknown and unseen contractor,
aka Number One. The goal is to extract a tidy sum from Sara’s well-to-do
businessman father.
 |
| Alberto Esparza and Claudia Trujillo |
The place they take
Sara is a beautiful old stone house (shot at Casa Felix, Olivella, near
Barcelona) in the middle of flippin’ nowhere, where she is tied up. Except for
Mrs. Peel (Sarah Tyler Shaw), no one really takes any time to try to connect to
the rightfully scared bound and blindfolded girl, which is understandable
considering the circumstances.
But, being a horror
film, if you can’t tell by the title, there is more afoot than meets the eye in
the creaky abode (man, I really love what we see of this house!). We get creaky
sounds from the locked basement, enough creepy atmosphere to figurately blow
the doors off with, and five criminals who do not trust the others in their own
group.
In the first half, at
least, there seems to be a heavy reliance on The Haunting (1963) where
you don’t actually see anything other than objects hinting at evil, such as a
key twisting in a lock over some highly dissonant music to set the appropriate mood.
That and the fact the people in the house cannot physically bring themselves to
leave (a nice way to keep them around without damaging the house).
 |
| Sarah Tyler Shaw |
More meat’n’taters
than Torres’ previous release from the year before, The Afterglow (2014),
but this still keeps up the artistic level, applied with more as an emphasis
than a hindrance. There is a strong use of shadows (showing off, among other
things, Shaw’s amazing cheekbones), dark filters, and angles that are just skewed
enough to be off-putting, often without being conscious. Plus, there is that
deep, mysterious bass sound that occurs to jangle the viewer’s nerves.
Without trying to give
away too much, there is definitely an Evil Dead (1981) vibe going on here,
with a malevolent force emanating from – well, it’s pretty apparent right off –
that possesses the kidnapping krew one by one, in some way or another, often
through the visual as a theme (eyes, mirrors, etc.). Instead of a Necronomicon,
there is a box of notes written in diary form. A cool aspect is that the next
victim’s name appears in blood somewhere, but you don’t know who that is
because they are all using pseudonyms. That is another great touch.
While filmed in Spain,
it is an English-spoken film (with Spanish subtitles). For me, the only
drawback was the accents, which are quite strong in some of the players, from
both the British and Spanish actors. Speaking of which, I wonder about Sara’s
eye make-up: while raccoon-eyed style, it does not seem to smear, even though
she has been crying profusely and is blindfolded. Ah, the magic of movies!
The gore, however, is
infrequent and all the more shocking because of it. Sometimes gore can enhance
a mood, but here it’s the moments of it that tie the tone to the story.
The acting is all
amazing, and the characters are nicely fleshed out in terms of personality even
without much of a backstory, considering they are anonymous even to each other.
That being said, by far the women have the strongest fortitude.
As possession films
go, this one is actually quite good, with a creepy, crawly overall mood, in
part thanks to the lighting of the stone interior, the soundtrack, and bass
that rumbles through numerous scenes and the off-set camera that I discussed
earlier. Any one of those things could work, but Torres manages to mash them
together into a terse and tense piece of genre cinema that is a beauty to
watch.
The Forsaken trailer HERE.
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