(For what it’s worth, the invention of the Abramelin and its demand for intricate, long-term preparation is credited to 14th-century Egyptian magician Abra-Melin.) It makes sense that if there could be a kind of pact between the dead and the living, it wouldn’t be taken lightly. Séances are rarely given such serious treatment on film. “Once it worked, twice it didn’t.” As he pours a salt border around the remote house she’s rented in Wales, he informs his employer that there’s no turning back now. “I’ve done this three times,” he tells Sophia. Initially, Joseph is as skeptical about the prospect of communing with spirits as viewers might be. READ MORE: ‘The Circle’ Review: Tom Hanks and Emma Watson Star In a Misguided Story of Technology Gone Wrong - Tribeca 2017 'Aftershock' Review: A Vital Look at the Maternal Mortality Crisis for Black Women in America 'My Old School' Review: A One-of-a-Kind Alan Cumming Performance Undone by Shrug-Worthy Hoax That revelation is what persuaded a reluctant and deeply unpleasant spiritualist named Joseph (Steve Oram) to take up her cause an offer of £80,000 apparently wasn’t enough. Soon we learn that Sophia is attempting to contact her dead child, although the circumstances of his death remain opaque. Lately she’s only been allowed to eat between dusk and dawn for the next few days, she’ll fast entirely. Intially it’s unclear exactly what the Ambramelin might be, but it’s clear the prep involves much more than digging out the Ouija board. In anticipation, Sophia (Catherine Walker) spent nearly half a year abstaining from all sex and following a strict diet. That’s certainly the case for “A Dark Song ” in writer-director Liam Gavin’s debut, a woman is so grief-stricken that she subjects herself to what might be the most arduous, drawn-out séance ever captured onscreen. Called the Ambramelin, this obscure ceremony is almost as stressful to observe as it is to enact - Gavin wants us to feel the mental, physical, and spiritual toll it takes on those desperate enough to invoke it.
Instead, A Dark Song disorients and disturbs the viewer, mirroring Sophia’s journey, as it builds to it’s psychedelic and phantasmagoric finale.Sometimes it isn’t the house that’s haunted it’s the people inside. The ritual sex ends up a brief, sad moment.
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At the same time, the film itself avoids many horror movie cliches. Almost every mystic element is thrown in: carved circles, chalk triangles, glasses of blood, a black bird, water, stones, candles.
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“Yep.” What follows is a claustrophobic and unsettling series of rituals and magical symbols. “Is it going to be horrible?” Sophia asks at the start, when he makes her eat a toadstool. He declares Sophia has to do all the cooking and cleaning, has to do everything he says, including ritual sex (“You, uh, ready for all that darlin’?”) as he hurls insults at her constantly like an occult drill sergeant. That’s more worthy of the mystic forces, and so they seal themselves off in the house and begin the Abramelin ritual.įor the first half of the film, it’s hard to know if Solomon is the real deal or just an abusive scam artist. Sophia convinces him that what she really wants is to contact her dead child, a boy who was murdered by teeangers in another cult ritual. This isn’t a spell you read off of a piece of paper. At first, Sophia says she wants the angel to grant her a love spell, and Solomon tells her to fuck off: “Just go on a fucking dating website or something.” The ritual they are going to perform is a months-long, psychologically-grueling plunge into dark magic. A grieving woman, Sophia (Catherine Walker), recruits an abrasive occultist, Joseph Solomon (Steve Oram), to conduct a grueling ritual that will allegedly let her contact her guardian angel. It isn’t your typical haunted house flick though. If so, then you should grab a bowl of pumpkin spice popcorn, turn off the lights, and queue up A Dark Song, a gorgeous and disturbing 2016 Irish horror film that’s streaming on Netflix.Ī Dark Song is the directorial debut of Irish/Welsh director Liam Gavin, and takes place almost entirely inside one creepy Welsh house.
If you’re also like me, you prefer your horror films atmospheric instead of gorey, uncanny instead of gross-out. October is almost here, which means miniature candy bars, pumpkin spice on damn near everything, and-if you’re like me-a month-long horror movie marathon.
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