Sacrifice

This movie was clearly made to entertain you while you doze off on the couch: semi intriguing premise, clunky pacing and the usual European folklore bric a brac composed of small communities, weird rites of fertility and secret cults.

I reside on the Shetland Islands, and I found it almost laughable that the director or producer decided to put the name of islands in a hat and pick out Unst on the Shetland Islands.

I also used to live in Unst before moving to the main town in Shetland, Lerwick (Leirvik, its Scandinavian title) and if only Unst had such high tech amenities and infrastructures, because it does not. lol

The film is poorly done with obvious editing errors in it.

I also noticed the very strong Scottish accents, which bares no resemblance to the Unst dialect or even this of Shetland.

It reminds me of the islands of Orkney, where children were taken from their parents because one child said the parents were involved in devil worshipping and alike. However, thankfully the children were returned to the parents after it was discovered the child made the story up.

I suspect this is where the Director/Producer got his story line from???

From the start you know this is going to stink when the lead asks her husband of many years "Your father doesn't know you're a diabetic, does he?", when they are IN HIS HOUSE having dinner! Presumably this didn't seem important enough to talk about before!

A nosy American doctor shows up at a remote Scottish island and without delay starts her own full scale murder investigation after she dug up a hole in her garden that uncovers a body! She immediately gets a job at the hospital, too. She must be a helluva doctor!

The bloody awful music tries to give an atmosphere of suspense for the entire 90 minutes... even when there's NOTHING HAPPENING!

The cult elements are never really explored, apart from a few daubings on walls and bodies... which the cops don't seem to think really matter.

Anyone who gets in the way is bumped off and for the cops it's just another day in the office. Happens all the time on these remote islands.

Somehow the house on the top of a mountain seems to have been FLOODED! How the bloody hell did that happen?

The final 20 minutes play out like the worst episode of a 1990's Ruth Rendell crap-fest.

Overall it's just very silly. It is Lifetime TV for people who think that Lifetime TV needs more murders!

This very much reminded me of the British crime series Silent Witness. Had the same feel to it. Also had a slightly "Wicker Man" feel to it. The characters were strong and though the story was a little far fetched it remained believable and convincing. It isn't a cinema quality film and certainly doesn't have special effects or big budget action scenes but the acting is good and the sense of malevolence and mystery compelling. It is worth watching and it kept my interest throughout. I liked the twists and turns, the scenery was beautiful and wild and created a dramatic backdrop to the story. I felt it was a pity this wasn't a pilot episode of a series as I would have carried on watching!

SACRIFICE is a horror film that doesn't want to be a horror film. Instead it would rather be a mature police procedural thriller, with lots of mystery aspects, but there's no getting away from the fact that the narrative is rooted in folk horror no matter how much the writer and director try to distance themselves from the genre.

The storyline is about an American doctor who goes to live on the Shetland islands with her husband and soon discovers a body missing a heart. It all points to sinister conspiracies and sacrifice, and she's soon up to her neck in danger. The film is beautifully shot - in Ireland for the most part - with lots of welcome outdoor location photography, and the plot feels like an episode of SILENT WITNESS with hints of THE WICKER MAN.

A shame, then, that the central detective story is so restrained and predictable. Radha Mitchell is a good actress, and she has a bit of charm here, but otherwise the it all feels very routine and difficult to get excited about. I liked seeing Ian McElhinney (GAME OF THRONES) in support but the rest of the cast are pretty boring, and things resolutely play out in the most predictable way imaginable.