Emmanuelle Béart and Rufus Sewell play a couple in Thailand staying on after their young son goes missing in the 2004 Tsunami in Fabrice Du Welz’s supernatural thriller.
During a presentation by volunteer workers at a charity, Jeanne (Béart) thinks she can see their missing son Joshua in the grainy footage of a film recently shot in Burma. She is so sure the blurry figure is their son she convinces husband Paul (Sewell) to journey deep into the jungle to find their son who they believe could have been trafficked into slavery.‘Vinyan’ as explained by their shady guide is “the confused, angry spirit of someone who has died a bad death and “does not know where to go or what to do.
Director Fabrice Du Welz creates a beautifully made eerie ghost story that is atmospheric and full of dread, without the need to rely on jump-scares and cheap shocks.
There are two wonderful dream sequences, one in an empty Thai club bathed in red light and pouring rain. The other reminiscent of John Carpenter’s The Fog as figures are glimpsed standing silently through the impenetrable mist. The harsh landscape blurs with dreams to create an abstract waking nightmare for the couple, whose decent into grief and madness consumes them both. Béart is compelling as the grief stricken mother; she’s fragile, painfully thin. Her features strained with the loss that will never leave her. She looks almost alien, unable to connect with her husband or the world around her. All he can do is look on at her transformation in horror whilst he too confronts his own demons.
Vinyan is a very simple film and I don’t want to give too much away other than it is elegant, atmospheric, creepy and excellently acted by the two leads.
OVERALL SUMMARY
Elegant, atmospheric, creepy and excellently acted by the two leads.
