Film review: Unwelcome is a horror that isn’t remotely scary, with a plot full of clichés
Unwelcome is an upcoming folk horror film directed by Jon Wright, co-written by Wright and Mark Stay.
★★☆☆☆
Unwelcome
(18s) opens with the newly pregnant Maya (Hannah John-Kamen) and Jamie (Douglas Booth) fleeing London after a violent home invasion, and arriving in rural Ireland to inherit a house left to Jamie by his recently deceased aunt.
Set on the edge of an ominously dark forest, the house seems rundown but idyllic, although their neighbour Maeve (Niamh Cusack) rather spoils the mood by insisting that Maya continues the tradition of leaving out raw meat every evening to satiate the ‘little people’, or fear dearg, who inhabit the forest.
Naturally, Maya and Jamie are sceptical, and not least because they have enough to worry about in wrangling the family of cowboy contractors, led by ‘Daddy’ Whelan (Colm Meaney), they’ve employed to fix up the house.
Those offended by Oirish stereotypes will find much to be exercised about here, although there’s no point in taking it personally: every character, whether Irish or English, or mythical creature, is a crudely drawn caricature.
Hannah John-Kamen is the exception to the rule, but by the end even her effervescent performance is sucked down into the plot’s quagmire of clichés and non-sequiturs.
(cinema release)
