The Plot: Blind psychic Dani (Caroly Bracken) works in a curio shop, dispensing words of wisdom and stern warnings to all who dare to enter. She investigates when there’s an incident involving her sister, turning up at the house of husband Ted (Gwilym Lee) who works as a doctor at a nearby mental institution. She brings a gift: an unusual wooden sculpture which sits with her at a table. Dark deeds are afoot and she’s determined to get to the bottom of this mystery…
The Verdict: Horror films can be a viable way into the film industry for any burgeoning filmmaker or aspiring actor (lots of actors started out in horror including Jennifer Aniston and one Tom Hanks). They’re often made with a tight budget in mind, delivering potentially high returns and subsequent acclaim. They’re also ten-a-penny and can often be lost into the streaming wilderness and soon forgotten, so it requires a talented filmmaker who knows how to make a theatrical horror film that stands out from the crowded marketplace. It also needs a filmmaker who can hold his nerve and deliver the required goods in the scares department while channelling the spirit of the venerable folk horror sub-genre. Such a filmmaker is Irish writer/director Damian McCarthy, who has delivered a cracking, creepy little shocker in the shapely form of the curious Oddity.
Following on from this year’s commendable Irish entry into folk horror All You Need Is Death, Oddity continues that slyly amusing trend of Irish humour wherein the characters (a) don’t know that they’re in a horror film and (b) have obviously never watched a horror film. If they had, they would know to run as fast as they can out of a situation wherein a crazed man with a glass eye turns up in the middle of the night warning of an intruder and asking to be admitted. That’s a quick but efficient way to grab an audience’s attention and that opening sequence sets up Oddity well. McCarthy’s script is cleverly constructed, playing into the conventions of the genre like character red herrings and peek-a-boo spooky faces melting in and out of the darkness. Nobody is quite what they seem in this film – well, except for Ted’s new partner Yana (Caroline Menton) who is so grounded and normal that nothing fazes her. The tense dialogue scenes between her and Dani pop with some great zingers. This is a film where characters say exactly what’s on their minds, with no filters or political correctness. How refreshing for a change.
McCarthy gradually builds up his story, layering in nefarious character motivations that initially seem to suggest that the characters are playing dumb – a source of the film’s rich, dark vein of bloody humour. They’re anything but stupid characters though. He directs his actors so that they get into the wink-wink tone of the piece and adjust their performances accordingly. The layering is also evident in the well-placed jump scares – not the kind of cheap ones that are often found in Hollywood diet horrors, but the genuinely unnerving ones which question a character’s sanity and what the audience just saw. He holds back the key scare until late in the game, tipping his director’s megaphone to German Expressionist cinema of the 1920s with the Golem-like figure of the freaky wooden man. The score by Richard G. Mitchell literally shrieks at times, aided in no small part by excellent sound design which catches every creak of a floorboard and the potential for violence.
This is a film to watch with a nervous cinema audience, as McCarthy combines scares and laughs in equal, effective measure – not an easy task by any means. Many horror comedies often fail to achieve the right balance – the cinematic benchmark here being An American Werewolf In London. To achieve that balance in only your second feature is worthy of a career in the film industry, so McCarthy is going places already. Oddity is his calling card signed in blood and a wonderfully oddball experience it is too.
Rating: 4 / 5
Review by Gareth O’Connor
Directed by Damian McCarthy.
Starring Carolyn Bracken, Gwilym Lee, Johnny French, Caroline Menton, Steve Wall.