STARVE ACRE (2023)

Studio:   Brainstorm Media
Director: Daniel Kokotajlo
Writer:   Daniel Kokotajlo
Producer: Tessa Ross, Juliette Howell, Emma Duffy
Stars:    Matt Smith, Morfydd Clark, Erin Richards, Robert Emms, Sean Gilder, Melanie Kilburn, Arthur Shaw

Review Score:

---

Summary:

Rural folklore takes an unexpected physical form for grieving parents reconciling with their troubled family's dark history.

---

Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Concerned parents Juliette and Richard Willoughby consult a psychiatric doctor after their son Owen uses a stick to gruesomely stab a pony in its eye at a fair. Juliette reveals Owen mentioned hearing someone named Jack Grey whistling inside his head, and Jack supposedly provokes Owen to do things he shouldn't. Richard later admits Jack Grey is a wood sprite from local folklore that his abusive father Neil and their longtime neighbor Gordon used to tell him about as a child.

While walking together in a large field outside their family's remote farmhouse, Richard tells Owen that the roots of an old oak tree lie somewhere in the ground. Owen adds that Gordon told him the tree's spirit was a doorway into other worlds.

While Juliette is seemingly entranced by the field outside, Owen suffers a sudden asthma attack and dies. With the family in mourning, Juliette's sister Harrie comes to help around the house in the aftermath.

Looking for a link to the stories from his childhood, Richard goes through his father Neil's old belongings and finds a handwritten journal about the area titled "Starve Acre." After reading through strange writings about invocations and ritualistic summonings, Richard realizes the abuses he suffered as a boy, such as being stripped naked and forced to stand in the freezing field, were his father's attempts to sacrifice him.

Juliette has a nightmare involving Owen. Richard later finds his wife sleepwalking in the field at night.

Gordon brings a woman named Mrs. Forde to the house to supposedly meditate with Juliette and Harrie. Mrs. Forde actually performs a candlelit ritual where a supernatural presence briefly disrupts the event. Afterward, Mrs. Forde announces "The Dandelion has bud" as she proclaims Owen's spirit has finally moved on. Meanwhile, Gordon attempts to make peace with Richard in a conversation where both men swear they never told Owen about Jack Grey.

Richard reconstructs a rabbit skeleton found in the field. Over time, the rabbit gradually reconstitutes until it mysteriously becomes a living creature once again.

Harrie finds Neil's journal. After reading about a Triquenta sacrifice, Harrie shows Juliette how the journal's mentions of a child, woman, and man being killed at a whistling tree in Starve Acre for "The Dandelion to bud" echo Mrs. Forde's jargon. Juliette realizes The Dandelion and Jack Grey are the same entity, and Neil was trying to release the spirit by using Richard as a sacrifice.

Steven, a colleague of Richard's from the university where they both teach, visits the farm to find Richard digging up massive tree roots. Richard recounts how angry villagers in the 17th century buried the roots because they believed they were sealing the "Womb of Nature," which was a spirit world entrance for pagans. Steven joins the dig and finds evidence that multiple people were previously hanged there.

The resurrected rabbit attacks Harrie's dog and viciously mauls her arm. Juliette becomes strangely fascinated by the rabbit and begins treating it like a child by placing it in a crib.

Juliette has a vision of Steven shouting "I am here for him" while brandishing a shovel in a menacing manner. Believing he intends to attack the rabbit, Juliette prepares to kill Steven.

Gordon finds Harrie attempting to use a public payphone nearby. Gordon confesses that Neil tried to summon The Dandelion by offering Richard as the first ransom. However, Jack chooses the sacrifices and only a beloved son like Owen would suffice. Gordon adds that the full ransom can be settled now that Richard has uncovered the entrance to the other world.

Juliette kills Steven with a knife. She then admits to Richard that when Owen suffered his fatal asthma attack, Jack transfixed her so she would have the clarity to see a better life without their son. Juliette tells Richard they will care for Jack now that they have given him physical form as the rabbit.

Harrie returns to the house to find Juliette and Richard bathing the rabbit like a baby. Outside, Gordon buries Steven's body while Mrs. Forde recites an incantation. With his hand held to the house, Gordon indicates they still need a third sacrifice.

Richard beats Harrie to death with a hammer to complete the ritual. Afterward, Juliette breastfeeds the rabbit while Richard sings a lullaby with his hand on her shoulder.

---

Review:

Not since "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" has a genre movie's title inspired such an accurate impression of the film's contents as "Starve Acre." The word "starve" calls to mind images of impoverished people stricken by famine, perhaps as part of a celebrity-narrated commercial asking for donations to save skeletal children in underprivileged countries. "Acre" sees its primary usage when discussing dimensions of large land areas like rural ranches and industrial farms. Put the two terms together and you're probably primed for something sleepy involving slow deterioration set in sprawling countryside, not an active slasher where victims meet violent ends on the bloody blades of a dangerous utility tool. The former, not the latter, definitely describes "Starve Acre."

Should your starting point still not be correctly calibrated, the first minute should get you there with a fade into white-on-back text packing three full stanzas of a poem titled "The Dandelion" onto the screen. Next up are static shots of quiet vistas where horizon lines lie low so the picture can be swathed in hazy skies overhead. Finally, a few mentions of football/soccer following a brief scene of cricket being played at a family fair firmly establish the film couldn't be any more English unless it served tea and crumpets while you watched.

Based on the same-named book by author Andrew Michael Hurley, "Starve Acre" tells the tale of Juliette and Richard Willoughby, parents to a young boy, Owen, whose disturbing act at the aforementioned fair compels them to consult a doctor regarding their son's troubling mental health. Richard's own troubled past weaves its way in by way of childhood memories where Richard suffered abuse from a father who forced him to strip naked and stand in a freezing field outside their family's farmhouse. Both of these father-son bonds end up connected by local folklore involving an old oak tree on their land that 17th-century pagans believed to be a doorway to other worlds.

The dreariness draping Richard and Juliette, who respectively spend an average day staring outside or collecting rocks with Owen, gets even gloomier after tragedy strikes. That's when figurative family ghosts reemerge to haunt their heads with mournfulness, melancholy, and more staring into emptiness.

During the approximate hour when these (un)events occur, "Starve Acre" fills silent spaces with sequences dominated by sluggish zooms, humming tones on the soundtrack, and staging where characters read newspapers or visit medical and academic offices. "Starve Acre" is not visually thrilling. Juliette picks at a stitched blanket. Richard trudges across snowy ground with his sullen head hanging low. It's strange how Matt Smith can be dynamic as Dr. Who or equal parts cunning and darkly comedic on "House of the Dragon," yet his indie film roles like this one here cast him as dully dour without any of the charismatic smolder he has on TV.

I acknowledge the tinge of slightly flippant cynicism to my preceding words, yet I've still tried to present "Starve Acre" as objectively as possible without spoiling the story. Movies made almost entirely out of mood just don't do much for me anymore. Neither do cautionary tales intent on teaching the redundant lesson that the dead should stay buried when horror has already cemented the notion that no one should ever monkey with resurrections, especially when they involve occult rituals.

However, the mid-road score also acknowledges that if artful atmosphere fills your cup, "Stave Acre" might be the folk horror equivalent of "Citizen Kane," or at least enough to satisfy a one-time itch for slow-burn suspense. Antithetical to its blander beginnings, "Starve Acre" finishes surprisingly strong with a creepy climax punctuated by an unforgettable image. It just takes so long to get there, passive viewers risk being disengaged by the time the payoff finally fulfills the plot's promise. This eerie ending will either be too little, too late for those who've already tuned out the tepid tone, or an impressively explosive crescendo for anyone transfixed by the film's measured, subtle build of suggestive darkness.

Review Score: 55

---