Menu
  • Home
  • About Us
  • Podcast
      • Slice of SciFi 962: Escape Pod: The Science Fiction AnthologyFeaturing “Escape Pod: The Science Fiction Anthology”
      • Slice of SciFi 961: BreachIndie SciFi Action: “Breach” takes on fleeing an alien invasion
      • Slice of SciFi 960: Hunter Hunter“Hunter Hunter”: When the lines between hunter and prey are blurred
      • Slice of SciFi: "Skylines" (2020)“Skylines”: Talking to Liam O’Donnell & Alexander Siddig
    • View all
  • Movie Reviews
      • Promising Young Woman (2020)“Promising Young Woman” and the harsh truths of trauma and justice
      • Review: Parallel (2020)“Parallel” takes on the mental and moral tolls of using parallel worlds
      • Review: I'm Your Woman (2020)“I’m Your Woman” shines with a different take on the mobster’s wife
      • Review: Archenemy (2020)“Archenemy”: Working with the Superhero You Find
    • View all
  • TV Reviews
      • "Project Blue Book"“Project Blue Book” explores the threads of UFO reports
      • Manifest Season 1: 5 Episodes In5 Episodes In: “Manifest”
      • 5 Episodes In: Reverie5 Episodes In: “Reverie”
      • 5 Episodes In: Marvel's Cloak and Dagger5 Episodes In: “Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger”
    • View all
  • DVD Reviews
      • The Dark and The Wicked (2020)“The Dark and The Wicked” and the Monstrous Weight of Grief
      • Bugs Bunny 80th Anniversary Collection“What’s Up Doc?”: A Look at 80 Years of Bugs Bunny
      • Batman: Death in the Family (2020, animated)“Batman: Death in the Family” makes alternate timelines fun
      • The Pale Door (2020)“The Pale Door”: A Weird Western Highlight
    • View all
  • Columns
  • News
      • TV News
      • Film News
      • DVD News
      • Interviews
      • Events
      • Geeky, Funny & Weird
      • Online Entertainment News
      • Music News
      • On Stage
      • Space News

Slice of SciFi

This is How We Geek Out: Interviews, Reviews & More

  • Writers, After Dark
  • Horror Happenings
  • The Babylon Podcast
  • SciFi Shop Talk
  • Slice of SciFi TV
  • Contact Us
“The Dark and The Wicked” and the Monstrous Weight of Grief

“The Dark and The Wicked” and the Monstrous Weight of Grief

December 24, 2020 By Chris Vander Kaay Leave a Comment

Director Bryan Bertino is most well known for his directorial debut, The Strangers, a quietly terrifying home invasion story. The gradual destruction of the home, figuratively and literally, has been the focus of Bertino’s entire career, from the couple in The Strangers to the families in Mockingbird to the mother and daughter in The Monster.

Add to that list the siblings at the center of The Dark and the Wicked, returning to the family farm to help their mother cope with the looming loss of their sick father. She doesn’t want them there, and at first, it seems a familial rift could be the cause of her distance. But an unexpected tragedy reveals their mother’s true fears.

If this sounds familiar, it’s because there are echoes of these plot points and themes in a number of recent indie horror films, from Relic to Hereditary. The last few years have created something of a subgenre with somber, slow-paced “grief as horror” arthouse films from studios like A24. With that ground so well worn recently, is there something new that The Dark and the Wicked brings to the table?

Bertino’s greatest skill as a filmmaker has always been narrative simplicity and emotional clarity. Rather than building towards an elaborate puzzle box revelation that brings all the pieces together, he allows us to simply sit, uncomfortably quiet amongst this family, feeling the blanket of grief that hangs over each moment. The sadness is palpable in this film, along with an undefined but powerful sense of dread.

Punctuated moments of violence, visions of loved ones thought dead, and torturous instructions whispered in the dead of night don’t finally come together to provide some grand revelation. They are tragic moments made all the more horrifying because they exist without a unifying purpose, unjust acts that will nonetheless go unpunished in a seemingly ambivalent universe.

The Dark and The Wicked (2020)
(L-R) Michael Abbott Jr. as Michael and Marin Ireland as Louise in the horror, “THE DARK AND THE WICKED,” a RLJE Films/Shudder release. Photo Courtesy of RLJE Films/Shudder.

Marin Ireland, a fantastic stage actress known best on TV for Sneaky Pete and The Umbrella Academy, anchors the film with a haunted performance that isn’t as immediately iconic as Toni Collette in Hereditary, but she brings nuance and believability without going over the top. Michael Abbott, Jr., an actor relatively unknown to me before this film, gives a performance as the brother that is so lived-in and authentic that it barely feels like acting at all.

The film is beautifully shot on location on Bertino’s own family’s Texas farm, which is a powerful metaphor for the family itself, a seemingly idyllic place secretly teeming with darkness. The tone of the film is pitch black and relentless. It is clear that was the intent, and the director was successful in achieving his goal, though that may not make it broadly appealing.

The one nitpick with the film was its reliance on a specific type of scare, used at least three times and perhaps more, that is at first effective but increasingly takes you out of the narrative every time it is used again. It is a minor quibble, however, in a film that is otherwise strong and assured in its tone and execution. The disc itself is bare bones in terms of extras, with only a Q&A and no other filmmaker interviews or commentaries; but the transfer looks stunning, keeping in line with Bertino’s previous work.

The film’s final moments may leave audiences scratching their heads or wondering, but it fits exactly with what Bertino set out to do: tell an unflinching tale of a family staring into the abyss of grief and loss, performing the same dance of acceptance and denial that we all do with mortality, before life gives us the answer we can no longer avoid.

4 out of 5 stars

THE DARK AND THE WICKED Blu-ray includes the bonus feature Fantasia Q&A with Marin Ireland and Michael Abbott Jr.


In THE DARK AND THE WICKED, on a secluded farm, a man is bedridden and fighting through his final breaths while his wife slowly succumbs to overwhelming grief. Siblings Louise (Marin Ireland) and Michael (Michael Abbott Jr.) return home to help, but it doesn’t take long for them to see that something’s wrong with mom—something more than her heavy sorrow. Gradually, they begin to suffer a darkness similar to their mother’s, marked by waking nightmares and a growing sense that an evil entity is taking over their family.

Starring Marin Ireland, Michael Abbott Jr., Xander Berkeley
Written and directed by Bryan Bertino

"The Dark and The Wicked" and the Monstrous Weight of Grief
4

Summary

Director Bryan Bertino is most well known for his directorial debut, The Strangers, a quietly terrifying home invasion story. The gradual destruction of the home, figuratively and literally, has been the focus of Bertino’s entire career, from the couple in The Strangers to the families in Mockingbird to the mother and daughter in The Monster.

Add to that list the siblings at the center of The Dark and the Wicked, returning to the family farm to help their mother cope with the looming loss of their sick father. She doesn’t want them there, and at first, it seems a familial rift could be the cause of her distance. But an unexpected tragedy reveals their mother’s true fears.

Sending
User Review
0 (0 votes)
TwitterFacebookEmail

Filed Under: DVD Reviews Tagged With: horror, Indie Films

About Chris Vander Kaay

Related Posts

Volition
“Volition” Acquired by Giant Pictures
Slice of SciFi #237: Interview with Brad Dourif on “Fading of the Cries”
Slice of SciFi 885: 15th International Horror & Sci-fi Film Festival
15th Annual International Horror & Sci-Fi Film Festival

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Search in posts
Search in pages
Filter by Categories
Audio Productions
Awards News
Book News
Book Reviews
Columns
Comics News
DVD News
DVD Reviews
Entertainment Business News
Events
Fan Films
Fan Productions
Film News
Film Reviews
Gaming News
Geeky, Funny & Weird
Human Interest
Interviews
Music News
On Stage
Online Entertainment News
Science News
Slice of SciFi
Slice Video News
Space News
Specials
Technology News
TV News
TV Reviews

Subscribe to Podcast

Apple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsAndroidiHeartRadioStitcherTuneInRSS

Listen to Slice of SciFi

iTunes
iHeart Radio
Player.FM
RSS
 

Keep Up With Slice of SciFi

  • Movie & TV Reviews

Recent Comments

  • dutch on “Parallel”: Isaac Ezban, Martin Wallström and Mark O’Brien: “If you pass this film up by saying, “Ugh, another parallel universe flick.”, you did not ask the right question.…”
  • Summer Brooks on “Near Dark”: Stacey Abbott on teaching vampire lore: “I hadn’t remembered until I was making the graphic for this episode that I own a copy of READING ANGEL…”
  • Joyce Gravino on “Near Dark”: Stacey Abbott on teaching vampire lore: “Thank you for this episode. I now have to to look for the reading angel book and the x-files one…”
  • Daniel M on Giveaway: “2067” on DVD: “back to the future”
  • jason f on Giveaway: “2067” on DVD: “I love Back To The Future, but also agree with Miguel. I remember seeing Star Trek IV at the movie…”
Tweets by @sliceofscifi
death to humans 160x600
Save 10-50% on in-stock toys at TFAW.com.

Slice of SciFi
1121 Annapolis Rd PMB 238
Odenton MD 21113
602-635-6976

Artwork:
Slice of SciFi spiral logo designed by Tim Callender

Theme Music:
Slice of SciFi music and themes
courtesy of Sci-Fried

Sister Sites:
Writers, After Dark
Horror Happenings
SciFi Shop Talk
Slice of SciFi TV

Copyright © 2005–2021 · Magazine Pro Theme On Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in