At The Movies with James Phelan: Hokum
A scene from Hokum.
The word hokum is defined as pretentious nonsense. Something blatantly absurd. I was wondering if the title suits this film but I suppose the entire feature is an exercise in proving there might be a chilling kernel of truth at the source of every supernatural legend.
Like the myths spun in rural Ireland that linger down the centuries. Tales of banshees, fairies, sprites and ghouls that persist to this day. Stories passed down by spoken word and which are on occasion seemingly kept alive to impress and entertain visitors to these shores. It’s this darker side of our folklore that is explored here in impressive fashion.
Because far from evoking thoughts of humdrum hokum, writer/director Damien McCarthy's ice-cold horror turns the land of a thousand welcomes into a sinister tourist trap where a snarky American novelist finds he can check in at a remote Irish hotel but checking out is a far more circuitous and twisted matter of life or death.
The visiting writer Ohm Bauman is played by Adam Scott (Severance/Parks and Recreation) and he’s a marvellously spiky creation. There’s no sugar coating him. He is abrasive, anti-social and is the definition of rude. He cuts to the quick those who are friendly or overly familiar. And he bizarrely seems to respect those who are as gruff as he is.
Ohm is in Ireland for a task that may excuse or at least explain some of his melancholy and rawness. He is scattering his parents’ ashes at the very hotel they honeymooned at decades earlier. Suffice to say he is struggling to see the appeal of their wedding destination. Although his writing instincts are tweaked by spotting that the honeymoon suite is strictly cordoned off. Apparently, the space isn’t hired out anymore and is totally shuttered to visitors.
Perhaps only to amuse themselves and intrigue their visitors, the hotel staff are prone to speculating on the forbidden area. Rumours range from hauntings to inexplicable disappearances. Because Ohm is a professional storyteller, he delights in taking all of these tall tales with a truckload of salt. Despite his scorn, Ohm is forced to concede that there is something to investigate when a staff member he actually connected with goes missing.
And all the answers seem to reside in the space trapped in time – the dusty stale honeymoon suite which Ohm infiltrates secretly. What he finds there may open his mind but stop his heart such is the ordeal that awaits him in increasingly claustrophobic quarters. Unlike last week’s film, this director doesn’t resort to gore. Rather it’s a pressure cooker atmosphere that primes the audience to be jolted by expertly delivered jump scares or spooked by sudden noises on the unsettling soundtrack.
Around the sole American star Scott, some of the best Irish character actors orbit. If this film is going to click internationally, you would hope it will boost the careers of tremendous local talents like Peter Coonan and David Wilmot. As the brittle blustering hotel manager, Coonan in particular shines here. By turns amiable and oily, no other Irish actor can flit between callow weakness and duplicitous strength quite like Coonan.
Bookended by a dark moral dilemma from Ohm’s own fiction, this is a tense and terse film sculptured with care and skill. ‘Hokum’ boasts all the ingredients for a sleeper breakout hit.
Though, ironically, after you watch it, you might not be able to sleep.
