Coming Home in the Dark
Cinematic miserablism for those who dug "Funny Games," "Wolf Creek" and "The Strangers."
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You ever watch a movie that you know full well is well-made, but it just ain’t for you? “Coming Home in the Dark” (available in select theaters and on VOD beginning Friday, Oct. 1) is a prime example of this trend. If you’re into films such as Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games” (either the Austrian or American version), Greg McLean’s “Wolf Creek” or Bryan Bertino’s “The Strangers” this might be in your wheelhouse. If not, you need not apply.
A New Zealand family comprised of school teacher father Hoaggie (Erik Thomson), his wife Jill (Miriama McDowell) and their two sons Maika and Jordan (real-life brothers Billy and Frankie Paratene, respectively) are taking a road trip. Their vacation hits a snag when they encounter drifters Mandrake (Daniel Gillies) and Tubs (Matthias Luafutu).
I don’t really want to say much more about the plot, but suffice it to say these folks’ lives worsen and/or shorten after encountering one another. There’s a horrific action that’s enacted early in the film and the filmmakers challenge their audience to “luxuriate” in all the awfulness that it entails.
First-time feature filmmaker James Ashcroft and his co-writer Eli Kent address an important issue in adapting a short story by Owen Marshall. Mandrake and Tubs are two of more than 650,000 people (many of whom are Maori) that were sequestered into state-run “Boys’ Homes” where they were often physically and sexually abused. The men enact their vengeance against the family in a scenario where Ashcroft and Kent seem to suggest that violence begets violence. I don’t care what the reason is – I generally don’t derive pleasure from seeing people tortured.
The filmmaking and performances are assured. I was especially impressed by Gillies, the cast member I was most familiar with from his turn as J. Jonah Jameson’s son John in Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man 2” and for co-starring in the shitty Elisha Cuthbert-fronted/ Roland Joffé-directed horror flick “Captivity.” (I guess Gillies was also on The CW’s “The Vampire Diaries” and its spinoff “The Originals,” but I’ve never seen those shows.) Gillies’ performance is ferocious enough that Mandrake is a character I won’t soon shake. He kinda calls to mind Rutger Hauer’s John Ryder from “The Hitcher” and Javier Bardem’s Anton Chigurh of “No Country for Old Men.”
Prior to committing the inciting incident Mandrake says, “Later on, when you're looking back at this occasion, I think that right there's going to be the moment you wish you'd done something.” For a lot of audiences I suspect that “something” will be turning this movie off or exiting the theater. Let the buyer beware.