Scotland is haunted by a mysterious woman who seduces men and dispatches of them afterwards.
Cold and slightly confusing.
This story does not make a lot of sense. You constantly think that you have almost got it, but then something happens and you get confused again. It is as if your perception of the plot constantly changes.
Now as I have written before, I am no expert on the subject, but in my scarce experience with and knowledge of the genre, I would suggest that this is a British reference to gialo. You keep wondering if what is happening is stylized or if it is really happening that way.
I kept thinking “who is the guy on the motorcycle representing?” Maybe he is The Devil and the high frequent sound of of the motor reving is the sound of a swarm of locust? Just a thought.
You could say that there is very little acting in this movie, but I disagree. There is very little dialogue and the part there is seems very random (which part of it actually also is!), but the strength of the very, very long pauses is so intense, and I think that Scarlett Johannson just nailed it perfectly. (Of course I might be a bit biased here, as I am a huge fan of hers).
The reason this movie caught my attention was because it was tagged as sci-fi on IMDB. This is a genre I’m very much into. It is also a very, as so many other story driven movies, spoiler prone genre. And that’s why I did not read further about the movie, but just fired it up and saw what happened.
Scarlet Johansen is eminent in this movie. She has space to act, a anti cliché role and a setting different from what most Hollywood movies can muster.
The pace and the direction of the movie is slow paced and arty, slow long shots, with an insisting sound scape that crawls under your skin.
I’d consider this more of a elaborate short film than a full fletched sci-fi as we’ve so ever used to. But then again. It’s super awesome to see how sub-stories can be told through this genre for instance.
The movie takes place in Scotland which works very well, both visually but also story wise.
I liked it and it kind of opened my eyes for Jonathan Glazer, and it also did carry on to watch Sexy Beast from 2000, which I remember hearing about but never got around to watching.