Review by
Eric Hillis
Directed by: Lee Haven Jones
Starring: Annes Elwy, Nia Roberts, Steffan Cennydd, Sion Alun Davies, Julian Lewis Jones
The recent folk-horror revival continues in director
Lee Haven Jones' Welsh language thriller The Feast. As is the remit of the sub-genre, it deals with tensions between
the past and present, tradition and progress. It also might be
described as an eco-horror, given its environmental themes. But in
practice, the sub-genre it most resembles is the rape-revenge
thriller, but here it's the rape of Mother Earth that's being
avenged.
Politician Gwyn (Julian Lewis Jones) and his Lady Macbeth wife
Glenda (Nia Roberts) have returned from London to spend time at
the latter's inherited home. Once a working farm, Glenda's childhood
home now houses their very modernist home, while farming has given way
to fracking. The couple's return has been necessitated by the fear of
scandals involving their two grown-up sons – drug addict Guto (Steffan Cennydd) and cycling obsessed Gweirydd (Sion Alun Davies), whose
indiscretions are later revealed – whom they've essentially grounded
to keep them away from the media.
Gwyn and Glenda throw a party in the hopes of convincing their
neighbour Mair (Lisa Palfrey) to allow fracking on her land, a
process that will be facilitated by the slimy consultant Euros (Rhodri Meilir). To assist with the preparations, Glenda enlists Cadi (Annes Elwy), a shy barmaid from the local pub. Practically mute, Cadi slinks
around the home like a stray animal that has come into contact with
humans for the first time. She barely speaks, but she does break into
a song that surprises Glenda, as it was a ditty often sung to her by
her mother.
As the evening progresses, it becomes clear that Cadi has it in for
Gwyn and his family. For half of its running time, the movie does a
great job of teasing out details of Cadi's true nature and ultimate
intentions. We're allowed enough time to get a sense of who Gwyn and
his brood are, while Cadi remains deliciously ambiguous. But once it
lays its cards on the table, The Feast doesn't know
where to go from that point. In this way it reminded me of Jordan
Peele's films –
Get Out
and
Us
– which similarly tease us to a point where they crudely spell out
their themes and then struggle to reach a satisfying conclusion.
The first half of The Feast feels like the work of a
fascinating new talent, and its subtitles, modernist setting and
middle class milieu give it the air of a polished Scandinavian
thriller. But after showing us so much, Jones and writer
Roger Williams resort to lazily telling us what's really
happening through leaden dialogue. With a couple of lines, the movie
abruptly switches from one genre to another, and it feels like a cheap
insult to an audience that has been fully invested to this
point.
Along with Elwy, who is mesmeric as the ethereal Cadi, Jones does
enough to suggest he's a filmmaker to keep an eye on in the coming
years. If he can make an entire movie that plays as well as the first
half of The Feast, we'll have a real talent on our hands, but his first film doesn't
satisfy enough to act as more than a calling card.
