Without Name

There are some odd occurrences that make you want to keep watching. All in all it's ju sty a lot of weirdness that doesn't amount to much but some psychedelic imagery and effects. Rather a waste of time for me.

This was very creepy thanks to clever photography and sound effects, and genuinely good acting. It is, however, a rather quiet and slow moving film with not much happening apart from the characters' minds playing tricks on them. It turns very weird towards the end. I think the guy who wrote this had too many mushrooms...

I fancied some escapism and had wanted to see this for a while. It looked dark, brooding and potentially a little off the wall. There's a lot of space here, in the frame, in the dialogue, it invites you in. Shot mostly in rural Ireland, Alan McKenna plays the central role, isolated in a simple existence. One of surveying said rural areas. Think forests, old country houses, with creepy books on the shelves, old framed cross-stitch on the walls and a sense of foreboding in the stillness. There's some good thriller tropes and it's a bit Blair Witch without the whining. There's enough bumps, creaks, menacingly eerie gusts of wind to keep you on your toes and more than one occasion that frightened the life out of me. If McKenna does a good job as he slips into his own paranoia and fictional confusion, the real stars are Gavin O'Brien and Neil O'Connor in the sound department, single handedly driving the tension in almost every scene. It's not brilliant and far from perfect, but it sweeps along building nicely and comes to an oddly satisfying end.

An Irish surveyor gets stuck in a possibly haunted forest.

As I was watching this, I thought to myself, "This reminds me a bit of Vivarium." Turns out the same guy directed both movies. I'm not sure what exactly triggered that thought, but this is just as slow-paced and lonely as Vivarium. If anything, it's even slower paced.

Again, I don't really think this was a horror movie so much as a psychological thriller. If you come into this expecting monsters and gore, you'll be pretty disappointed. It's very European and influenced by 60s and 70s movies, I think. If you're into 70s folk horror, you'll probably enjoy this more than the IMDb rating suggests.

Ireland has some really beautiful forests. I can understand why filmmakers spend so much time shooting in them. Still, Without Name goes to extremes with endless shots of trees and nature. It's very pretty and makes me want to go explore a forest, but a bit more plot and fewer lingering shots of trees would have been nice.

The actors are pretty good, but you'll mostly be following Alan McKenna around the forest. The forest itself is pretty much his costar, though some other characters show up. The sound effects and score give the forest a Blair Witch atmosphere. It was eerie at times, but I'm honestly not especially fond of that whole Blair Witch thing.

If you don't mind a slow pace and a LOT of (pretty) shots of trees, this is worth checking out. If you're expecting bloodthirsty faeries to slash their way through a group of teenage friends, skip it.

The natural world, with its serenity and stillness, brings comfort for many. For Eric, a land surveyor who heads to the woods solely to escape a shattered marriage, it brings something else. Summoned by a mysterious client to a cabin far from the concrete dullness of his suburban home, Eric eagerly awaits the arrival of Olivia who is both surveying partner and mistress. Olivia encourages Eric to live his dreams, yet he is a man who has none. Within the mist and moss covered forest, shadows intrude. The stillness combined with obtrusive locals, unsettle something in Eric's psyche.

Without Name immerses the audience in a surreal world filled with spectral auras and tones. The forest alternately glows and darkens, appearing like a dance floor where possibilities brighten in the flickering light, then dissipate into murkiness again. I love this film theme, where reality and dreams merge together and become indistinguishable from each other. I only wish the dialogue and action sequences were as deep as the film themes. Seen at the Miami International Film Festival.