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You know you’re not in for a light watch when sitting down to view something entitled “The Damned” (now in select theaters).
Odessa Young (“Assassination Nation”) stars as Eva, a 19th-century widow living in an Icelandic village alongside Daniel (British gangster television mainstay Joe Cole), Ragnar (Rory McCann, best known to me at least as the “yarp/narp” guy from “Hot Fuzz” and The Hound from “Game of Thrones”) and other fishermen.
In the midst of an especially harsh winter the villagers must make a terribly tough decision when a foreign vessel capsizes off the coast of their community. They can choose to help others or look out for themselves in the face of famine, hypothermia and possible plague. Their choices have dire consequences of a supernatural sort.
“The Damned” is the feature debut of Thordur Palsson, who shot the film in his native Iceland. It’s scripted by Jamie Hannigan (a writer on the Paramount+ series “The Woman in the Wall”) from a story by Palsson. The beautiful scenery (capably captured by Icelandic cinematographer Eli Arenson, he shot two 2024 genre offerings – “The Watchers” and “The Deliverance”) serves in stark contrast to the horrors seen on screen.
I didn’t watch “The Damned” under the most ideal of circumstances – on a laptop in bed with my wife in a suburban Cincinnati hotel room while drinking bourbon (actually, this sounds pretty great) – and it’s been a minute since I’ve seen it, but I recollect it being a moody movie.
It’s a slow-burn piece of folk horror that’s also a moral parable and at times recalled John Carpenter’s “The Thing.” It’s only 89 minutes long, but feels lengthier. It’s an intentional slog if you will. We’re very purposefully supposed to feel the characters’ struggle. Speaking of the characters, they’re well-acted by Young and Cole, but I could’ve gone for more McCann as I’m a fan.
“The Damned” is one hell of a cold weather movie that I suspect plays better on the BIG screen. This weekend would likely be an ideal and immersive time to see it. It’s stark, simple and effective at being affective.