A creepy farm house, slimy men, dimly lit spaces, creepy paraphernalia and a little bit of supernatural expertise. Yeah, this will not end well. What that happens to be is a supernatural horror effort called Oddity, which will make sure that you will keep the lights on and all the doors locked like they've never been locked before.
Our inciting incident finds a woman named Dani (Carolyn Bracken) alone at night at her and her husband Ted's (Gwilym Lee) new farm house where she gets a visit from an escaped mental health institute patient Olin (Tadhg Murphy), Ted being his doctor there. Some time later, we discover that Dani was murdered that night when her twin sister Darcy (Bracken in a dual role), a blind psychic, visits the house where Ted is now living with his new girlfriend Yana (Caroline Menton). Darcy brings along with her a life-sized, wooden mannequin for supernatural guidance as she's looking to dig for the truth behind Dani's murder since she doesn't believe that Olin was responsible for the crime.
With Oddity, writer-director Damian McCarthy is crafting a slow burn as the film gradually twists and turns the central relationships until the knots become too unwieldy to untangle. It's more so how the movie decides to do that that creates some unnecessary problems for itself since there are a lot of plot conveniences and shaky character work, which you have to sit through in order to get to the paranormal tug of war.
And plot or even story mechanics is the last thing that you want to think about when watching this type of atmospheric horror because ideally you'd want the vibes and scares to swallow you whole, even if a fairly ordinary murder mystery is thrown into that pot as well. The story that McCarthy has conjured just doesn't hold much water, partly because the characters and their motivations aren't properly fleshed out so you'd be invested either in their downfall or quest for justice, and partly because the film doesn't exactly fulfil the promises that it offers initially with its practical design elements.
In terms of the ambience, however, Oddity more than delivers. Our main location—shaped by production designer Lauren Kelly presumably on both a soundstage and at the practical location—provides plenty of interesting angles and blocking options for cinematographer Colm Hogan and McCarthy to explore. Excluding some manipulative sound mixing choices (by Aza Hand), all the creepy, demonic set pieces are finely executed, the film's imagery being easily the main reason why one could happily sit in a dark room for 90 minutes, pretending not to be scared as Yana in particular experiences all kinds of terror. These fright factors also draw more emotive performances from Bracken and Menton; their portrayals of desperation, anguish and polite(ish) malice supply some much needed dramatic tension that the murder storyline, featuring Lee, simply doesn't have.
As a result, this is more or less an intriguing directorial showcase with solid horror jolts, but one that ultimately becomes frustrating due to the undercooked story, which doesn't leave much of an aftertaste. If you're looking at it as a supernatural experience only, you can definitely have a decent time, but if you wish to be invested in its characters' psychological journeys and whodunnit elements, you'll probably be a bit let down by how it all evolves.
Smileys: Atmosphere
Frowneys: Story, premise
Never look a gift screaming, wooden man in the mouth.
2.5/5
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