In the dark depths of last Thursday night, I caught Isolation with The Dulcinea and a friend at the Orpheum. It's an Irish horror film that takes places on a secluded diary farm. And thusly it was extremely appropriate for a Wisconsin audience.
Although the film is unlikely to enter the pantheon of great human achievements, it was quite a bit of fun. The first act was great. It was moody, creepy and full of visceral scenes. A veterinarian comes to the isolated dairy farm of an anxious farmer to check out a pregnant cow. Along the way, we discover that the farmer has a couple squatters on his land. A young couple has parked their van with a small trailer home in tow in one of his fields. The vet sets out to determine the health of the unborn calf and of course we get to see the vet stick her arm inside the cow. She has a hard time getting her arm out and there's a violent snap. When she finally manages to free her appendage, we see that there's a gouge on her hand. Despite this eldritch occurrence, she declares that the calf is fine and that there's nothing to worry about. She leaves and the farmer goes to bed. But he is awoken by the cries of the cow. He goes into the barn only to find her bleeding. He enlists the help of the young man out in the trailer home. The calf's feet are sticking out so they tie ropes to them and try to pull it out with the aid of a hand wench.
It is here that the film really excels. The cinematography is great. Hand-held camerawork gives the film a gritty feel while the lighting cuts the scene into areas of dim, dreary light and dark shadows. And I appreciated that there was no music on the soundtrack here either. We see the calf's hind legs and the sweat on the men's brows; we hear the moans of the cow, the men's grunts, and the metallic clicking of the wench. There was no need to add music to "force" a particular reaction in the audience because the visuals and the diagetic sounds do the job perfectly.
Unfortunately, Isolation wasn't able to maintain this momentum as it devolves into a rather hackneyed horror film after this. We find out that this cow is part of a genetic experiment by some company represented by the stereotypical cold, rational scientist. The vet acts on his behalf by giving the cow check-ups and making sure things are proceeding smoothly. The calf is eventually wrenched from the womb. It is euthanized and the scientist does an autopsy. It is revealed that it was pregnant while in the womb with multiple fetuses being removed. But they're not normal; they're exoskeletal. This scene was bit like the one in Alien when they analyze the dead remains of the tentacled version of the creature. One of the fetuses is still alive and it escapes only to grow into a large monster and, well, you know the rest.
I got the impression that writer/director Billy O'Brien was a fan of horror movies himself and that he intended this film to be another entry in the post-modern tradition of Halloween where the director knows that the audience is familiar with all of the horror film conventions and clichés. Instead of going against the grain, O'Brien plays them up. For instance, there's a scene in which the creature is down in the sluices beneath the barns floor. The farmer is injured so, when he tries to do the thing that everyone in the audience doesn't want him to do but know he's going to do anyway – go down in the creepy, mutant-cow inhabited sluice, he is unable to do so. Instead, the beautiful, young woman in the story volunteers and goes after the monster. Plus there were several moments when something would jump out at a character and there'd be a loud noise on the soundtrack to jolt audience members. It was very clichéd and unfortunately, in a sense, considering how moody and scary the first act was without such devices. There was a notable exception in the second(?) act where the creature is in what I took to be a retaining pond. The characters are armed at this point and the farmer drives his tractor into the pond in order to drive the creature out and towards the folks awaiting it with guns cocked and loaded. As he drives around, the water gets deeper and eventually the engine stalls while the farmer is out in the middle of the pond. This was a great scene and I wish there were more like this one in the latter half of the movie.
Taken for what it is, Isolation was a lot of fun. I was startled more than once and The Dulcinea was muttering "No, don't" at various points. I guess my friend nearly jumped into her lap at one point. So it was a good bit of scary fun. Plus setting it on a dairy farm was a bit of a novelty which resonated with us folk here in the Dairy State. I must admit that I don't think I've eaten beef since I saw this film…
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