Damned, The (United Kingdom/Iceland/Ireland, 2024)

For parts of its running length, The Damned feels like it could be a lost gem: a below-the-radar horror film that stays true to its indie roots while generating sufficient scares to warrant a recommendation to genre fans. Sadly, although director Thordur Palsson succeeds in developing the setting and crafting an atmosphere that is unnerving for both its natural and supernatural aspects, the screenplay (credited to Jamie Hannigan, based on a story by Palsson) fails in several critical areas – it never develops any of the secondary characters and the ending falls flat, even when one considers the introduction of a last-minute “twist.”

The lead character, Eva – the only one to emerge from the bleakness of the snowy Icelandic background – is played with a forceful, forthright determination by actress Odessa Young (who left an impression in 2021’s Mothering Sunday).  The widow of the owner of a fishing village, she one of only two women among a group of men. As they get drunk and sing, she sits quietly and observes, knowing the only thing that matters is that they can get in a boat the next day and bring back a large enough catch to keep everyone’s bellies full. There are hints of a suppressed romantic attraction between Eva and one of the men, Daniel (Joe Cole), but it’s never developed beyond meaningful glances and a near-kiss. (The scene where he shows her how to use a gun functions as foreplay, much as it was with Ripley & Hicks in Aliens.)

One day, an offshore shipwreck offers the potential of spoils. The elation of such a possible windfall turns to dismay when the fishermen discover stranded survivors unable to make it to shore. Torn between offering a rescue – which would mean too many mouths to feed and the possibility of swamping the boat by putting it well above capacity – and leaving the victims to die of exposure and drowning, the villagers choose the latter. Once they have returned home and the bodies begin washing ashore, Eva and the others are wracked with guilt. But there may also be a more tangible issue: the presence of a draugr – an animated corpse whose hunger for death is fueled by its rage. Unless it is destroyed by fire, it will whittle down the small population until there is no one left.

Atmospherics play a key part in The Damned being effective for a good part of its running length. There’s a monotonous quality to the passage of time, with the steely, snowy, short days offering little relief from the long, lantern-lit nights. We are trapped here with the villagers – the nearest other settlement being three days away – and their fears become ours. The movie qualifies as a “slow burn” thriller, with the paranormal explanation gaining traction with each unexpected death and unexplained occurrence. Life in a place like this is hard enough under optimum conditions, but it becomes desperate with little food and a draugr haunting the shadows.

As with too many horror movies, however, the movie lacks the time or inclination to invest effort into the development of anyone other than the main character. It’s evident from the beginning that Eva is going to be The Last One Standing (or at least one of a few). This undercuts some of the tension. None of the men could be considered even two-dimensional – if they have names, I don’t remember them (excepting Daniel). Movies set in isolated locales – John Carpenter’s The Thing and Robert Eggers’ The Lighthouse come to mind – are effective because, although such films feature clear protagonists, there is development beyond them.

The ending is a letdown. In actuality, there are two endings. The first one seems concrete while the second one is intended to impart a different meaning and throw much of the previous 60 minutes into ambiguity. Neither really works. The first is generic and the second is artificial. The less conventional explanation might have struck paydirt if the movie as a whole had seeded the twist along the way rather than suddenly dropping it on viewers in the final minute of screen time. I left The Damned with a vague sense of dissatisfaction.

The horror elements are adequate. Palsson uses sound cues to create jump scares (although these lose their potency after the first few) and the setting generates the perfect opportunity for isolation and paranoia. Young is very good in her part, making Eva a strong, flawed character whose depth helps to counterbalance the shallowness of everyone else. On the whole, however, The Damned wasn’t able to achieve what I was hoping from it and, rather than being an overlooked gem, it’s instead simply “overlooked.” One would expect its theatrical shelf life to be brief. On streaming, it might make an effective double-feature with Carpenter’s The Fog.

Damned, The (United Kingdom/Iceland/Ireland, 2024)