BARBARIANS (2021)

Studio:     IFC Midnight
Director:    Charles Dorfman
Writer:     Charles Dorfman, Statten Roeg
Producer:  Jason Newmark, Laurie Cook, Charles Dorfman
Stars:     Iwan Rheon, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Tom Cullen, Ines Spiridonov, Connor Swindells, Tommy McDowell, Will Kemp

Review Score:

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Summary:

Uncomfortable secrets come out at a dinner party between two couples, but the night takes an even stranger turn when masked intruders invade their home.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Entrepreneur Lucas Hunt makes a deal to build a small, posh housing development called Gateway on remote farmland belonging to The Wickes Family. However, a subsequent dispute over the property leads to a heated courtroom battle during which family patriarch Alan Wickes suffers a heart attack and dies.

ADAM & EVA

Renowned artist Eva Velasquez creates a sculpture for Gateway based on the area’s mysterious Gaeta Stone. As part of her arrangement with Lucas, Eva plans to permanently reside in her Gateway home, although her husband, film director Adam Davies, has reservations about continuing to live there.

While jogging, Adam sees a dying fox caught in barbed wire. Adam tries to free the fox, but ultimately leaves it alone after the fox tries to bite him.

Adam becomes jealous when he comes home to find farmhand Dan Wickes, who regards Adam with contempt, flirting with Eva. Inexplicably, Adam also finds the dying fox collapsed on his kitchen floor. When Adam’s feeble attempt to shoo the animal away fails, Dan euthanizes the fox with his bare hands.

Once Dan leaves, Adam tells Eva how he dislikes Dan’s obvious feelings for her. Eva insists that she wants to raise a family at Gateway, even though Adam is uncomfortable.

LUCAS & CHLOE

Lucas livestreams a solstice celebration at the Gaeta Stone, but is forced to leave by locals who blame him for Alan Wickes’ death. Lucas and his girlfriend, aspiring artist Chloe, then continue on their way to Gateway.

ALL TOGETHER NOW

Lucas and Chloe arrive at Adam and Eva’s for a dinner to celebrate Adam’s birthday. Because Lucas often emasculates him passive aggressively, Adam tells Lucas about finding the fox in his kitchen, but claims he killed it himself. Lucas gives Adam a small bottle containing a liquid hallucinogen as a gift.

DINNER

Eva eyes Adam knowingly when Lucas mentions that Adam supposedly killed a fox with his bare hands. Lucas further insults Adam by comparing his new movie idea to “Encino Man.” Lucas also goads Adam into slapping him, which adds more tension to the meal. Later, Adam puts the hallucinogen in Lucas’ drink to retaliate for his perceived mistreatment.

Chloe reveals she is pregnant. Adam privately confronts Chloe about paternity since the two of them had an affair. Chloe tells Adam to go on as though nothing happened between them.

Lucas tells Eva that he received a substantial offer on the house he promised her, implying she and Adam will have to move out. Eva counters by threatening to withhold her sculpture unless Lucas agrees to sell her the home for half of the cost they initially settled on. Lucas agrees to Eva’s terms.

Lucas brings out the housing contract for Eva and Adam. As Lucas starts livestreaming Gateway welcoming its first official residents, Adam gets cold feet and refuses to sign the paper.

Lucas insults Adam. Adam throws a drink on Lucas, which leads to a physical fight between the two men. To everyone’s shock, Adam blurts out that he might be the father of Chloe’s baby.

INVASION

Three masked men later revealed to be brothers John, Neil, and Dan Wickes invade the house and take everyone hostage. The men proceed to trash the home before covering Lucas in animal blood and forcing him to read a humiliating confession on camera.

TABLES TURN

Feeling the effects of the hallucinogen, Lucas suddenly breaks free from his restraints and kills John with a corkscrew. Neil chases Lucas outside.

Eva and Chloe overpower and unmask Dan. Chloe wonders aloud what happened to make Lucas behave so strangely. Eva realizes Adam spiked his drink. Adam apologizes for possibly impregnating Chloe, which prompts Eva to slap him. Blaming himself for Lucas’ violent behavior, Adam takes a shotgun outside to go after Lucas and Neil.

In nearby woods, Neil shows Lucas his face. Neil explains that no one was supposed to get hurt in the home invasion, but the brothers merely wanted to scare Lucas for what he did to their father. Lucas attacks Neil, but Neil eventually gets the upper hand and kills Lucas.

Adam arrives, but he is unable to pull the trigger when Neil approaches him. Neil takes the weapon and takes Adam captive.

FINALE

Neil returns to the house holding Adam at gunpoint. Neil forces Eva and Chloe to free Dan. After some private plotting, the three hostages fight back. Chloe stabs Dan, but Dan shoots her dead. Adam tackles Neil through a second floor window. Neil dies when he hits the ground.

Eva finds herself unable to shoot Dan. After recovering from his fall, Adam takes the weapon from Eva and executes Dan. Adam embraces Eva.

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Review:

Over the preceding nine years, I’ve reviewed more than 1,700 feature films. Only two or three times have I watched a movie and not written a review because I just couldn’t see what there was to talk about. The last time that happened was probably 2014 or 2015, but it almost happened again with “Barbarians.”

Usually, before I even press Play, I have a guess as to where my review might start. Maybe a movie reminds me of a personal anecdote I can share, like “Studio 666” did (review here), or maybe I’ll have an idea for a tangent that addresses a broader topic like sequel fatigue, toxic fandom, or a specific director’s filmography.

Even when I don’t have an initial notion to leap off of, I’ll often find one before a film’s first act gets too far. Yet after 30 minutes of “Barbarians,” I saw myself staring at a blinking cursor on a blank page that had no notes at all. At this point I wondered, should I listen to my disinterest and turn off the movie? Should I see it through to the end and hope inspiration strikes? What if it turns out that a 1,000-word review could have been a simple 280-character tweet instead?

That last musing might be true because “Barbarians” is so basic, it’s a movie that just kind of “is.” Not great. Not terrible. Just another routine extra point splitting the uprights of mediocrity. All I can really do with it is to be equally basic, writing a review that boringly goes by the book without getting cute or creative because “Barbarians” won’t allow anything more.

The Story: It’s fine. “Barbarians” starts with some background about a magical, mysterious monument called the Gaeta Stone that resides on remote farmland where revelers hold a solstice celebration. If you’re thinking this means some Stonehenge-inspired fiction or “Halloween III” kookiness, think again. Whatever the stone supposedly symbolizes, I didn’t get it, but I’ll have more on the movie’s messy metaphors later. For now, forget about anything related to cults, folklore, or pagan practices that possibly open paranormal portals. In fact, forget I brought up the stone at all since that’s what “Barbarians” seemingly does.

“Barbarians” boils down to illustrating relationship dynamics between two couples. Adam and Eva are the first pair. He is a fledgling filmmaker who’s a bit of a coward, constantly feeling emasculated by the assertive men and women around him. She is a renowned artist who accepted an assignment to recreate the Gaeta Stone as a sculpture in the center of a posh little housing development.

Lucas and Chloe constitute the other couple. Lucas is essentially a successful Silicon Valley tech bro in the body of a British real estate entrepreneur. He built the development where Eva’s sculpture resides, but he did so by stepping on the necks of the family who owns surrounding farmland. Chloe is his pregnant girlfriend. There’s not much more to her than that.

Lucas and Adam are also friends. Sort of. Lucas picks on Adam like a baby brother, gleefully putting him in arm bars for no real reason, taunting him by semi-playfully calling him a “pussy,” and maintaining an attitude that’s passive aggressive at best and deliberately condescending at worst.

The four friends gather at Eva’s house in Lucas’ development to celebrate Adam’s birthday. As their night rolls on, Adam begins to boil over as he endures “I was just joking” insults at his expense. When Adam’s wick finally burns down to the dynamite, several secrets spill out that put everyone’s hands figuratively and literally around each other’s throats.

Their “dinner party from hell” turns into a home invasion however, when three masked men burst in at the worst possible moment. Personal grudges have to go back in the cooler while everyone contends with this new threat, assuming they can still get along well enough to survive the night together.

The Acting: It’s fine. Tom Cullen does a good job to balance Lucas between handsome charmer and alpha a-hole. It’s an easy role, and Cullen comes with a personality that plugs into the part perfectly. Iwan Rheon is of course best known as despicable worm Ramsay Bolton on “Game of Thrones,” so it’s a nice switch to see him playing a subservient “yes, dear” type for a change. He melts into that mentality too, biting his tongue and slumping his shoulders to sell a sad sack like you wouldn’t believe possible for an actor who comes with Ramsay Bolton’s baggage.

The Cinematography: It’s fine. “Barbarians” is a single location dramatic thriller with only seven actors, but it feels less confined than such setups usually do thanks to that location being large. It’s also situated in picturesque countryside, which additionally opens up the production so the camera feels free and its angles aren’t repeatedly pointed at similar sights over and over again.

The Movie’s Meaning: You’re on your own here. It’s likely that writer/director Charles Dorfman named the primary pair Adam and Eva as a biblical reference. Adam and Lucas more or less regard each other as siblings, so perhaps there’s a Cain and Abel connection in there too. For what purpose, I don’t know. It’s as muddy as the fox that appears at least four times in another recurring motif. If the dying fox only appeared in Adam’s visions, I’d say it was representative of his fear of decisive action. Except everyone else can see the fox too, so I have little idea what to make of the fact that it can seemingly transport itself Star Trek-style from one location to another.

“Barbarians” offers a textbook definition of “average.” Am I glad I saw it? I’m unsure. Probably not. I do know that if I hadn’t watched the movie, I wouldn’t have missed anything and would have gone on with my day just fine without it. And then you would have only had to read a quick tweet instead of ending up all the way down here at the bottom.

Review Score: 50

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