The Damned, 2024.
Directed by Thordur Palsson.
Starring Odessa Young, Joe Cole, Siobhan Finneran, Rory McCann, Turlough Convery, Lewis Gribben, Francis Magee, and Mícheál Óg Lane.
SYNOPSIS:
A 19th-century widow has to make an impossible choice when, during an especially cruel winter, a foreign ship sinks off the coast of her Icelandic fishing village.
A draugr is different from a ghost; it’s much more dangerous. Something along those lines is reiterated roughly three times (maybe more) throughout director Thordur Palsson’s The Damned, as it bluntly tells viewers where the admittedly chilly atmospheric thriller will go while also meandering and indulging in the usual jump scare and hallucination horror techniques attempting to mask that there isn’t much going on here. It’s a matter of waiting (and waiting) for the characters to acknowledge that the tales about the draugr are real and that they must prepare to do something about it amid losing grasp on their sanity and combating starvation.
What’s especially frustrating is that before anything supernatural is heavily suggested, in The Damned (coming from a screenplay by Jamie Hannigan), there is mild intrigue in observing this 19th-century fishing crew tough out a harsh tundra climate with impossible sailing conditions while also running low on food. They then have to decide if they want to save some lives from an incoming shipwreck or if it would be worth the trouble since it would mean more mouths to feed with food they don’t have.
The crew briefly bickers about it before their gruff and hotheaded leader Ragnar (Rory McCann) shuts that debate down, asserting that it would be detrimental to their survival. Since Odessa Young’s compassionate widow Eva runs the fishing outpost, the final say is flung in her direction, although even she reluctantly agrees that Ragnar is making the correct, difficult choice.
Their luck somewhat turns around as they eventually recover some supplies from that shipwreck. However, the crew also begins discovering dead bodies as a traumatic reminder of the morally bankrupt choice they made. Madness also settles into the characters, namely Eva, who starts noticing eerie, shadowy figures in the corner of a room (an unsettling shot from cinematographer Eli Arenson due to the stillness of the image and unclear silhouette design, causing one to question if there is a person or supernatural creature there at all or if it’s a fabrication of our imagination), but it’s the type aiming for cheap jolts substituting anything resembling characterization.
There are attempts to flesh out Eva through conversations with crewmember Daniel (Joe Cole), who worked alongside her honorable husband before he tragically passed on the job. Again, it falls under the weight of the bland and drawn out (even at only 89 minutes) scare machine The Damned becomes, ditching its much more tantalizing morality play premise in the process. The filmmakers only see that aspect as a device to spring on horror but with little meaning and no depth. Solid performances, harsh environments, and an oppressive atmosphere are wasted. Draugr or not, this is familiarly dull, even with a change in location and folklore.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association, Critics Choice Association, and Online Film Critics Society. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews and follow my BlueSky or Letterboxd
