The Banishing
In “The Banishing,” which comes to Shudder on April 15, a family moves into a house where unspeakable tragedy took place three years ago. If that sounds familiar, it’s because it is a very familiar horror narrative. Christopher Smith’s riff on this idea, working from the screenplay by David Beton, Ray Bogdanovich and Dean Lines, is inspired by a true story of questioning faith in the face of the unexplainable. It’s an intriguing ghost story, first and foremost, although not distinct enough in its ideas to really hold our attention.
The film has a prologue where a reverend on the English countryside is dealing with dark magic and visions, which seem to manifest into something deadly. Another minister calls for the local head of the Church, but it’s too late. The house is closed for three years before the Church brings in a new reverend (Linus, played by John Heffernan) moves in with his wife (Marianne, played by Jessica Brown Findlay) and their daughter (Adelaide, played by Anya McKenna-Bruce) in hopes of reuniting the parishioners. It begins well, but at night, Marianne begins to see visions, and Adelaide has interesting play time with her dolls. Linus is met by a local expert in dark magic (Sean Harris) with warnings, but they go unheeded, even as the visions seem to get more and more brutal.
“The Banishing” wants to be a slow-burn horror movie, but it doesn’t really give us a strong emotional connection with the characters so that we will go through that with Marianne, Linus and Adelaide. There seems to be a tension between the members of the family that largely goes unsaid, but the fact that it goes unsaid for a long time- and that the main conversation happens not between husband and wife but Marianne and the vicar from the beginning of the film (Malachi, played by John Lynch)- feels like it diffuses the tension further. The spectre of WWII hangs over the film, but it doesn’t really fit into the narrative of the movie. Individual sequences of terror and dread are effective, but the story as a whole just didn’t really grab me. It has a lot of promise, but ultimately, the ended doesn’t land as well as it should, because the film as a whole doesn’t grab us on an emotional level. If you’re a fan of this subgenre of horror, however, there’s enough here to merit a viewing.
