by Anthony O'Connor
Worth: $14.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Dark Nights Film Fest
Cast:
Michael Weston, A.J. Buckley, Lennon Sickels, Ricky Watson, Joana Vinogradoff, Crazy Horse
Intro:
…the perfect film for those who like clever, stripped back genre flicks with compelling narratives and endings that clobber you right in the soul.
Is there such a thing as an unforgivable act? A crime so serious, so dire, that no punishment can be too extreme? And what place does forgiveness have in the face of atrocity? These are the weighty themes explored in Bark, a nasty little thriller from director Marc Schölermann that opens with tense claustrophobia and ends… very differently.
Bark is the story of Nolan Bentley (Michael Weston), a bloke who wakes up in the middle of a thick forest, bound to a tree, with very little memory of how he got there. More to the point, he has no idea why he’s in this bizarre predicament and as the hours tick by, he struggles to hold onto his sanity. Eventually, he is visited by a gruff fellow, The Outdoorsman (A.J. Buckley), an enigmatic figure who, while he doesn’t seem to want to hurt Nolan, also refuses to do anything to help him. Why is Nolan tied to the tree, for what action is he being punished and perhaps most importantly: how the hell is he going to get out of it?
Bark is, at its core, a single location slow burn thriller that depends greatly on how much you a) care about Nolan and b) want to know why he’s in this situation. Michael Weston does a solid enough job as the unluckiest man in the world, but the script by Steve Fauquier doesn’t quite do enough to keep the mystery front of mind for the full runtime. There’s only so many times you can watch someone squirm, beg and cry before it begins to feel a little repetitive and the second act does drag a little. That said, the third act reveal and climax of the film are darkly poetic and terrifically surprising, making the juice worth the squeeze if you can exercise some patience in the mid section.
Ultimately Bark is the perfect film for those who like clever, stripped back genre flicks with compelling narratives and endings that clobber you right in the soul. Audiences seeking immediate gratification may find their attention wandering but for those attuned to these deliberate, tense and very claustrophobic rhythms, Bark bites very hard indeed.
