BAGHEAD

CONTAINS SPOILERS

Yes, it's been a while. To be honest, there's hardly been anything on worth writing about or, indeed, seeing as far as I'm concerned for the last three months, to the extent that I put my cinema card on hold until they started showing things I was interested in. 2023 was scarcely a vintage year for horror films - too many unnecessary sequels that missed their marks, and few originals of any greatness - and 2024 has not started well. Night Swim was terrible, and somehow Baghead has managed to be no better.

In itself, there is nothing inherently wrong with the basic, potentially persuasive thrust of the film: a young woman inherits an old pub and discovers too late that she is now the keeper and guardian of a mysterious and ancient supernatural entity locked in the basement, with demonic powers that can become hopelessly addictive. And on no account must it ever be allowed to go free... A perfectly decent setup. However, what sinks Baghead is the fact that, even by modern horror movie standards, the entire thing takes place in near to total darkness, to the extent that I honestly thought there was something wrong with my eyesight as I constantly tried to make out something in the murk. Seriously, when the ambient light from the screen is drowned out by the ceiling lights in the cinema, something is wrong.

Not only does this make the film visually unappealing, it makes no dramatic sense either. The electricity in the building is quite clearly switched on, so why does our idiot heroine spend the entire time in the dark? Why does she constantly wander through the place - her own place, which she knows has a monster in the cellar - armed only with her mobile phone light and one of the feeblest torches in existence? Look, I understand that much of the film takes place in a  dim basement, but we the audience need to have some point of reference as to what we're supposed to be looking at. Just because the characters can't see anything doesn't mean we shouldn't be able to either. And it's clearly an aesthetic decision, because even the scenes taking place outside in broad daylight appeared to have been shot through the grandmother of all solar eclipses. Even what I've seen of the short film from which it's been expanded looks too dark.

Baghead certainly has an intriguing and interesting idea behind it, and there are a couple of effectively shivery frissons and jumpy moments early on which are nicely timed; I just wish I'd been able to see them properly! Those minor moments aside, it hasn't been realized nearly as well as it should have been. A disappointment, and an inauspicious start to the year.

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