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THE CURSE OF AUDREY EARNSHAW
Director: Thomas Robert Lee Cast: Catherine Walker, Jessica Reynolds, Jared Abrahamson, Hannah Emily Anderson, Don McKeller, Sean McGinley, Geraldine O'Rawe MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:30 Release Date: 10/2/20 (limited); 10/6/20 (digital & on-demand) |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | October 2, 2020 Madness and/or witchcraft slowly overtake a small village, isolated from the rest of modern civilization. That's the premise of writer/director Thomas Robert Lee's The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw, which doesn't do much new but does present its story with a strong command of mood. The latter quality is more important. A lengthy text introduction informs us of a community of devoutly religious people who emigrated from Ireland to somewhere in North America in the late 19th century. About a hundred years later (Some low-flying planes remind us of the time period), the small town is still suffering from the effects of a pestilence that ravaged the community about 17 years before the story's start. Only Agatha Earnshaw (Catherine Walker), the owner of a farm located a few miles outside of town, continued to prosper, leading many to believe that some dark magic was involved. She has a few secrets, we learn early on, mainly the existence of her 17-year-old daughter Audrey (Jessica Reynolds), who was born during the "eclipse" and has had to spend her life hiding from the community. There aren't many secrets within Lee's screenplay, which quickly establishes that Agatha and Audrey are part of a coven of witches. Cutting to the chase, Audrey puts a curse on Colm (Jared Abrahamson) and Bridget (Hannah Emily Anderson), after the former strikes Agatha for coming into town with an abundance of food during the funeral of the couple's young son. The few secrets—Audrey's origin, mainly—are mostly inconsequential. Instead, Lee observes how the desperation of the townsfolk gradually drives them toward paranoia and despair, eventually acting up those feelings. The dual irony is that Agatha and Audrey's roles as scapegoats are probably earned and that these people, so consumed by want and misery and hopelessness, likely don't need the influence of witchcraft to push them over the edge. They are pushed, though, by circumstances natural and supernatural. That two-pronged attack on the sanity of the townsfolk leads to some grisly sequences of violence. Save for a climax that digs into the occult, Lee mostly plays this straight—more as a study of human suffering than as a horror show of the paranormal. Drenched in gloom (Nick Thomas' crisp but bleak cinematography has the chilly bite of approaching winter) and always moving toward doom, The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw has a sinister sense of inevitability. Copyright © 2020 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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