AZRAEL
***
Directed by E.L. Katz
Starring Samara Weaving, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, Katariina Unt.
Horror, US, 85 minutes, Certificate TBC
Reviewed as part of Pigeon Shrine FrightFest 2024
Years after what appears to be the Rapture, the survivors of the human race have given up “the sin of speech” in director E.L. Katz’s intriguing spin on post apocalyptic cinema. Working from a script by Simon Barrett, we follow a young woman played by Samara Weaving on the run from a mute religious cult and bloodthirsty creatures, as she searches for her kidnapped boyfriend. It is certainly a promising and ambitious premise but is it one that pays off? In some ways it does and in others not so much. That being said the film still manages to prove its worth as an effective horror potboiler.
This is due in no small part to its heroine, effectively played by Samara Weaving. The Australian actress has certainly put in the groundwork in the genre before but aside from her plucky lead role in Radio Silence’s READY OR NOT, she rarely gets a chance to prove her true worth as she is usually relegated to bit parts in the likes of SCREAM VI and BABYLON, a film that had a great deal of fun comparing her to its leading lady, fellow countrywoman Margot Robbie. Here however she takes centre stage in an entirely dialogue free role where she is utterly convincing and has the audience onside with her as she goes through Hell to rescue her partner from a gang of zealots for nefarious purposes. With the scar of a crucifix across her throat displaying the origins of her silence, Weaving expertly communicates her emotion and motivation through expression alone without the need for overacting.
Barrett’s script is ambitious enough and set up nicely by the opening credits crawl which shies away from explicitly explaining the how and why of this world we find ourselves in. As a writer who has more than proved himself with slick and witty dialogue in the likes of YOU’RE NEXT and THE GUEST, it is rewarding to see him stretching himself in such a way with a story that could be challenging for any number of writers. The world building, although limited due to its small budget, is convincing enough and the revelations brought into the light by the fiery and bloody climax are pleasingly sinister and transgressive.
The lack of budget is sometimes glaringly apparent. Yet again here is another film set in the woods for seemingly no reason provided by its story. There is very little sense that this is a world in ruins as we traipse yet again through a landscape that is all too familiar from any number of low budget genre films that have to resort to this anonymous backdrop that no doubt cuts down costs but provides little in atmosphere or world building. The visual design for the flesh ripping creatures that prowl through the woods stalking the human cast is somewhat limited also, amounting to little more than grown men in black bodypaint and sharp teeth. Also, despite its jumping off point with its Christian blood and thunder staging ground there seems to be a reluctance to really explore and get to grips with this backdrop and meld it more successfully with its chosen genre.
Nevertheless, Katz's direction is competent enough, leading the audience along with enough gruelling and grisly flesh-ripping action along the way and manages to rise above comparisons to A QUIET PLACE, perhaps its most obvious counterpart. Clocking in at a brief eighty five minutes the film refuses to overstay its welcome and has enough action and thematic ideas of its own on display that you may be happy to return to this particular world, especially after its energising and intriguingly dark conclusion.
Iain MacLeod
