THE CALLING
Starring Susan Sarandon, Christopher Heyerdahl
Directed by Jason Stone
Ever caught yourself watching Fargo and thinking, “You know what this is missing? Suffocating sombreness and some Se7en-style ritualized murders.”
If so, this Canadian thriller is for you.
Hazel (Susan Sarandon) is a small-town Ontario cop who takes what she can get, be it painkillers stolen from a crime scene or a quick drink with her boyfriend before he returns to his wife.
Covered under a blanket of snow, her sleepy community of Fort Dundas is shaken when Hazel discovers a murdered senior who’s neck has been cleaved open and face moulded into a mask of horror. A bit of research reveals this isn’t the first such desecration of the deceased, elevating a murder investigation into a hunt for a serial killer.
Perhaps all of the local red herring are trapped under a layer of ice in a nearby frozen lake because the decision is made to immediately reveal the culprit: Christopher Heyerdahl’s naturopathic killer who’s fluent in cryptic, armed with creepy songs for kids and inclined to consider himself an angel of mercy.
Remember: All of this is played straight.
This places the film in the awkward position of foregoing suspense in favour of hesitantly investigating moral quandaries and clumsily exploring Hazel’s backstory through expository dialogue that’s less dignified than most interrogation scenes.
Director Jason Stone possesses strong technical skills but offers a clear sense of where his true talents lie in an entertainment-trumps-implausibility sequence that sees Hazel turning a slideshow of disfigured victims into a macabre flip book as she searches for a coded message. It gives a viewer faith that it won’t be long before Stone atones for the sins perpetrated here.
