Review of the film "Solstice" - a beautiful philosophical drama, which was called a horror

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

You will definitely be delighted with the vivid picture and eerie scenes. You may not even understand what this story is about. But that's how it was intended.

A new film from the original director Ari Astaire has been released on Russian screens. A year ago, this almost unknown author conquered the audience with a very unusual horror "Reincarnation" - a slow and frightening story about a family, which is haunted by the ancestral curse.

Then the audience was divided into two categories. Some were delighted with the complex plot and non-standard approach to the genre, others were disappointed, because the trailers promised a dynamic horror film, and they had to wait almost until the very end of the picture.

The fact is that Aster's debut was partly a victim of an advertising campaign. The picture was promoted as a horror film, collecting all the most terrifying scenes in trailers. But in fact, the director created an almost Greek tragedy about the lack of choice in life.

A story about "Reincarnation" in the context of the release of "Solstice" is essential. After all, Astaire continues to follow the same principles in his new work, which is again being promoted as a horror film. Moreover, Russian localizers even added to the posters the phrase “The age-old darkness will awaken”, which has nothing to do with either the plot or the original slogan “Let the celebrations begin”.

This creates false expectations, reinforced by trailers, in which almost half of the most tense moments can again be seen. And some of the scenes from the videos are not in the picture at all.

In fact, "Solstice" is not a horror, but an experiment. A beautiful slow film about finding yourself, filled with contrasts and requiring complete immersion in the atmosphere of what is happening. It is in order to make the viewer look more attentively that the director deceives expectations several times.

Deception one: drama instead of horror

The plot begins with the fact that the girl Dani (Florence Pugh) dies all her relatives. Her boyfriend Christian (Jack Raynor) has long been going to leave his friend, but after the tragic events he decides to postpone and takes her on a trip. One of the friends invited them to stay at the solstice in the unusual Swedish village of Kharga.

Arriving there, the heroes are faced with a very strange order of the community. They seem just unusual, but then they start to scare. And unwittingly, the guests become participants in terrible rituals.

Even in an attempt to retell the plot, there is some irony. It may seem that another standard slasher has come out - a traditional subspecies of horror films, where silly teenagers come to a scary place and they are killed there.

Fits in stereotypes and a set of characters: a preoccupied joker, a smart guy, a handsome man and a girl. Horror connoisseurs can even speculate about the order in which they should die.

But all this is just a form and a very small element of the narrative. If you perceive the film as a slasher, then the timing of two and a half hours and the very slow development of the action will only tire you. After all, the story is about something else. It is much better to pay attention to what is happening with the main character. And then the picture turns into a real drama.

It is not for nothing that Ari Asta drags out the introduction, making you feel the pain of loss and at the same time the insincerity of Dani's relationship with Christian. All these uncomfortable conversations, long pauses and constant excuses will surely seem familiar to many.

And only after getting into the commune, the girl meets sincere people. Those who do not divide into their own and others', do not steal and raise children together. But the main thing is different: these people have a completely different attitude to the loss of loved ones.

The changes in Dani become the main, but not the only, driving force of the plot. It is no less interesting to watch the rest of the heroes, each of whom has his own path and his own shortcomings.

And in this regard, "Solstice" can be compared with "Antichrist" by Lars von Trier - here, too, isolation from modern society awakens ancient instincts and they turn out to be closer and more understandable than the traditional order.

Deception two: beauty instead of darkness

Everyone knows that the time of standard horror is night. The creepiest creatures come from the dark, and often what cannot be seen is more intimidating than perfectly designed monsters.

Even in "Reincarnation" Ari Astaire, although he boldly dealt with the standard moves for the genre, still followed these principles. But in "Solstice" he only teases the viewer at the beginning - several scary scenes take place in the semi-darkness.

And then the director turns on the light.

Solstice was shot very beautifully. From the very beginning of the trip, Aster and his constant cameraman Pavel Pogozhelsky, with whom the director created his early short films, capture the viewer with an amazing picture.

The editing is done very dynamically and gracefully, allowing the characters to instantly move from one location to another. In this case, more protracted scenes can be shown in one frame without gluing. And the camera sometimes makes amazing flights, turns, or even flips.

A brighter horror film can hardly be found in modern cinema. After all, here the action does not just take place in the daylight - the sun hardly sets at all.

And to this is added the white clothes of the inhabitants of Kharga, their fair skin and kind smiles. A significant part of the time is devoted to mysterious rituals, most often very beautiful: dancing, eating together and other cute things. It is the guests who look "dark" here: they are distinguished by their clothes, their appearance, and their behavior.

Still, Solstice is scary. Moreover, Asta deliberately or even maliciously avoids screamers and other cheap ways to catch up with horror. In the most eerie moments, the sound is not twisted to the maximum, as James Wang does in The Conjuring. On the contrary: everything happens in silence, almost everyday. And if they show some unpleasant physiological details, then this is not an end in itself, but only a method of immersion.

For the director, it is more important to force the viewer not to jump in the chair, but to feel uncomfortable, to feel as if he himself was in this community. And so some of the elements can be really annoying. For example, every night, somewhere behind the scenes, a child is crying, atonal violins are playing in the background, and some of the characters behave frighteningly unnatural.

And the constant expectation of something terrible turns out to be more important than the terrible scenes themselves. After all, this is a film about the path, not about the result.

Deception three: people instead of monsters

"The age-old darkness will awaken," Russian posters promise. In trailers, mysterious faces flicker, people take off, and the rituals clearly resemble some kind of magic.

But "Solstice" will rather allow you to get acquainted with the way of life of ancient communities, albeit on a fictional example, than with mysticism. Of course, you can remember the film "The Wicker Man", where the action was also associated with the occultists and their orders.

But Ari Astaire devotes much more time to the story of simple customs. Moreover, he perfectly explains why and how they existed or even still exist and how those for whom such a life is the only norm behaved. And "Solstice" is really a good excursion, if not into history, then into psychology and the opportunity to observe how people bring themselves to ecstasy with a simple dance or all together experience the emotion of one person.

This is how it worked in real communities, and the film only reflects an almost real past, which can turn out to be worse than any Stephen King's fantasy.

Therefore, much attention is paid to the choreography and general scenes, at a certain moment connecting the "Solstice" with the recent "Suspiria". Therefore, every action of the inhabitants of the community receives a logical explanation. But this makes it even worse.

But the most important thing to understand before watching Solstice is that everything described above is not a spoiler for the plot or its interpretation. This film cannot be retellable at all: there are very few events in it, and its perception is primarily associated not with action, but with sensations. And they will each have their own.

To achieve emotions and complete immersion, the painting lasts two and a half hours. For the same reason, the director places a plot from another in the form of one genre. All for the sake of each viewer himself going through this journey and deciding for himself what the author wanted to say, which world is closer to him and who was the main character of this story. If there is one at all.