Metaphorical psychological horror directorial debuts from Australian female filmmakers – do we have a future possible hyper-niche listing for viewers scrolling Netflix?
I say that because it was hard not to watch Relic and compare it to The Babadook afterwards for the reasons listed above – The Babadook catapulted first-time director Jennifer Kent to the international stage (I’m surprised she isn’t directing the next Marvel movie?) for its chilling story and the heavily metaphorical approach it took to horror of repressed grief and loss.
In case it’s not clear, the comparison is a favorable one.
Relic stars Emily Mortimer as Kay, a woman who is called up to check on her mother after her mother appears to go missing. Kay brings her daughter, Sam (Bella Heathcote) with to her mother Edna’s (Robyn Nevin) home for the search. After a few fruitless days of searching, Edna simply reappears, seemingly with no memory or no interest in describing where she’d been. As Kay begins to notice signs of Edna’s mental decay – post-it notes with reminders for basic tasks, her lack of memory of her disappearance – she wonders if her mother’s at risk of hurting herself and toys with the idea of putting her in an assisted living facility. Before she can take action, though, the forces responsible for Edna’s disappearance grip the whole house, putting Kay, Sam, and Edna all in danger.
Horror elements aside, the topic at hand is a particularly heart-wrenching one in a moment like ours, when so many have lost their parents to a deadly pandemic via community transition in assisted living facilities. Relic tackles the guilt that comes along with making a decision like that, along with the pain of seeing someone you know and love slowly lose their memories of you and even their personalities. It explores this story potentially even more than the horror arc, which is more like set dressing for the overall theme.
Ironically, it also employs a few House of Leaves-esque moves by featuring the house itself as a character. I say ironically because I recently reviewed another film that did this with considerably less success. In this case, it works – the house becomes unfamiliar and strange to all three women as new rooms appear and become impossible in size and shape, much as dementia tightens its grip on Edna and the shape of her own world becomes more distorted.
At times, the heavy metaphor behind Relic becomes so intense that it may even be slightly distracting – the metaphor works beautifully for 95% of the film but strains the storytelling towards the end, sacrificing its function on the horror level to make for a more beautiful and emotional ending on the metaphorical realm. Generally, it functions more successfully as a heartaching story of a family than as a white-knuckle frightfest.
That qualm aside, Relic is a touching and painful look at the devastating effects of losing a parent to dementia. With stellar performances from all three of its leading women, it is well-worth the investment in what is still a relatively quiet and empty theatrical landscape.