7th October 2018 | 31 Days of “Alternative” Horror: Darling
The film I picked for the 7th day sits in a strange dark place within contemporary horror. The film Darling was written and directed by Mickey Keating, a young director who made this daring chiller at the age of 25. The film pays homage to the early films of Roman Polanski, but you can see many influences from Kubrick’s sense of symmetry in framing to Hitchcock’s lean in and out of suspense. The 76 minute running time is not to be taken lightly. The film has a way of both slowing down and speeding up your sense of time, and you may find that by the end of it, you’ve been fed enough to feel comfortably full.
Darling tells the story of a mysterious Madame played by Sean Young who requires a caretaker to be present in the house while she is away. The house is not the typical inner city family home. The town house is more like a museum — immaculately presented with fine furnishings in every room. The Madame finds herself without excuses as she explains the house and its history to the new caretaker: in this case, a young woman called Darling, played by with exacting skill and emotion by Lauren Ashley Carter. The explanation of the murderous past bears a striking resemblance to the interview scene in The Shining, where Jack Torrance played by Jack Nicholson is told exactly what happened to the place’s former caretakers. Even though Darling doesn’t act quite as enthusiastically as Jack Nicholson did in the Shining, she willingly takes the cheque, accepting the job without hesitation.
The film was shot in monochrome simply because the film’s influences come from an era of black and white disturbia. Think Repulsion in both the tracking shots and in those moments of intrusive voyeurism.
Frantic moments jump out with extremes of low and high key lighting. The balanced, midtones give us a moment to take in what is a very clean vision. The cinematography makes strict use of what is laid out from the set decoration: forming perfect lines out of darkness and light. Filmed in New York, the movie sets the tone for the known cinematic trope: isolation within a bustling metropolis.
We stay close to Darling throughout the film. In fact, we never really leave her side. We roam with her, moving in and out of her mind’s eye. It’s as if the camera is intruding on her space. The only time the camera leaves her alone is when she goes about her initial viewing of the house and all its rooms or when she is alone with a man whom she stalked and then later, picked up at a crowded bar. The space between us is framed with symmetry, making almost every shot a stationary vision of precision. The angles become broken from that symmetry the higher up in the house she gets — a distinction only between moments when she is in control and when she is not.
It is easy to think of this film as just another psycho chiller. Indeed the director Mickey Keating’s use of smash cuts and jump scares are evident to that affect. It is however the film’s underscore, ambience and overall soundtrack that tells the story. There is very little dialogue which adds the David Lynch layer to this already reference filled experience.
As I mentioned before, this film’s soundscape holds everything together so make sure you not only watch this film in the darkness of night, but wear noise cancelling headphones if you dare.
Written by: Stephen Radford
website: stephenradford.com
Next: 8th October: Pontypool
