The Abandoned

I have no idea how I’ve missed this, but The Abandoned (2006) is one of those rare movies that riveted me.  It helps if you’re not of the group that expects explosions or flying body parts every 2.3 minutes.  This movie gives a slow, but continuous, build of tension.

It stars Anastasia Hille as Marie and Karl Roden as Nicolai.  I really enjoyed the work of both of these actors in the movie.  So much so that, by the end of the movie, I really wanted to see more of them.  The locale (set in Russia, filmed in Bulgaria) is both beautiful and subtly ominous.   The film’s soundtrack is another rare work of being non-intrusive, yet aiding in building the tension.

Marie had been adopted by an American couple when she was a baby.  She returns to Russia to visit her family’s home (which she inherited after her mother died several years before and which she finds out about through a notary in Russia).

Her arrival at the notary’s office is when things get weird.  And wonderful.  And creepy.  And confusing.

Marie meets Nicolai (the brother she didn’t know she had) at the family farm and their dive into family history begins.

While it’s unclear just what the overall story is (zombies, ghosts, undead, an unending time loop???), it’s a trip worth taking.  It’s fascinating and keeps you watching and, at the end, leaves you wondering.  There may be cultural beliefs/legends that might fill in the blanks that, as an American viewer, I don’t know.

Several notes of caution:

There is some brief nudity.  There is one particularly disturbing scene regarding Nicolai’s death.  And, while this isn’t a first-person shaky-cam movie, shaky-cam is used to effect in a couple of scenes.  One of those scenes goes on for a bit.  While I normally hate it, it was well-done and added to a sense of disorientation.  I was surprised to not mind it.

If you like a decent, suspenseful thriller, you won’t be disappointed.  There are some wonderful moments in it, it’s well-acted, it delivers (except for the storyline), and the actors bring something to it that you don’t often see.  They just are perfect for their roles.

Absentia

Occasionally, I get lucky and stumble across a movie that I actually like.  It is at those moments that I question my sanity.  But that’s a topic for another day.  Plus, you won’t get regaled you with the crap I’ve seen (like the abysmal, disjointed, predictable, poorly written, bland, and uninteresting Side Effects with Jude Law – so bad that it may never get reviewed by me because…well…I don’t think there’s a way to verbally convey how bad it is).

Absentia is a really nice little movie.  It fits, to a T, the first line of the Wikipedia definition of suspense:

Suspense is a feeling of pleasurable fascination and excitement mixed with apprehension, tension, and anxiety developed from an unpredictable, mysterious, and rousing source of entertainment.

The movie was funded via Kickstarter (I did not fund this movie and have no ties, financial or otherwise, to it), and the cast members are newer and somewhat unknown.

It starts off slowly, but I found myself engaged pretty quickly.  Courtney Bell stars as Tricia. Katie Parker co-stars as her sister Callie.  Tricia’s husband Daniel has been missing for seven years, and she’s in the process of having him declared dead when Callie comes back into her life.  Callie had also been absent for a long period – different rehab places in different states, maybe some other wandering during that time.

Callie is a recovering addict who seems to be clean.  She’s found a little religion (a very minor theme which also plays off of Tricia’s Buddhism prayers) and healthy living; one day, while out running she encounters a man in a pedestrian tunnel.  Someone that appears to be your rather stock “homeless” guy, even though she’s a bit freaked out by him.  And things slowly start getting weirder and weirder.  Piles of small things (buttons, watches, etc.) show up first on their doorstep and, later in Callie’s bed.

Then, Daniel reappears.  Which kind of throws a monkeywrench in Tricia’s relationship with the detective she’s been seeing.   Eventually, Callie discovers that people have been disappearing in that area for a long time.

The best thing about this movie is the technique.  Most of the reactions of the people involved seem like “now, that’s how most people would react in that situation”.  No overblown emotional shit; no stoic “nothing can phase me” shit; no flying karate kicks to the Adam’s apple shit – the actors made the characters believable.  There is one excellent “gotcha!” scene.  I’m sitting on the edge of the sofa with a nice bowl of ice cream.  You know it’s coming.  Yep.  Yeah.  Yes.  Come on alreaBAM!  My spoon goes flying across the room.  Just perfect timing.  Several times, I was sitting on the edge of the sofa actually caring about what might happen to the characters.  Because they did a great job with building suspense both in the movie (things happen slowly, up to a point) and with the soundtrack. While there are a couple of loud moments, mostly the soundtrack is minimal and is there to add to the sense of suspense.  When was the last time you saw a movie and found yourself suddenly at the edge of your seat?

Another nice touch was showing possible logical explanations, from a logical police officer POV, for everything that happened.  Although it may not necessarily be what really happened.  A “well of course there’s nothing supernatural going on because it can all be logically explained (unless there is something supernatural going on)” thing.  The movie serves up a little something to think about without being “this movie has a message”.

All of the actors were really good.  I found myself liking their characters and wanting to see the actors in other work.

Definitely a nice pick for Halloween time.

Absentia poster