Sea Fever *** / *****
Directed by: Neasa
Hardiman.
The Irish, sea-farring horror film, Sea Fever, kind of plays like a feature version of a cold open of an X-Files episode – those small vignettes that let us see part of what Mulder and Scully will be investigating that week. It isn’t the most original horror film – you can certainly see its influences like Ridley Scott’s Alien in the first half, and John Carpenter’s The Thing in the second, but debut filmmaker Neasa Hardiman does give the film a nice, lived in quality to it – the characters are not cookie cutters, and you can feel what life aboard this small, fishing vessel would be like – how difficult and claustrophobic it would be, even without the horror elements.
The star of the film is Siobhan (Hermione Corfield), a young scientist, who is even more of an introvert in a field full of them. We see her pouring over data in a lab, while the rest of her co-workers celebrate with birthday cake – her professor urging her to interact with others. Things don’t get easier for her when she boards the small fishing boat that will be her home for a few weeks. She is there to study the anomalies in the daily catch made by the crew – led by captain Gerard (Dougray Scott) and his wife Freya (Connie Nielsen). It’s and a small crew other than that – engineer Omid (Ardalan Esmaili), along with a cook Clara (Olwen Fouere) and two more men for good measure – Johnny (Jack Hickey) and Sudi (Elie Bouakaze). Siobhan would be an outsider regardless – and it’s played up just how much, since she has scientific explanations that the rest of the crew chalk up to myths and superstitions. Those superstitions include Siobhan’s red hair being a bad omen. The crew though is friendly to Siobhan – it’s clear Gerard and Freya wouldn’t have allowed her on her board if they weren’t being paid – and their own financial situation contributes to why they do it even then.
Things get ominous when the boat enters a zone that they have been told by the coast guard is off limits. This is a blow to them, because that is where their catch is, so when they drift into it, Gerard doesn’t do anything to stop them – and soon they are hauling in a lot of fish. But they hit something, and it’s clear something isn’t quite right. Siobhan has to dive into the water – she can scuba dive, the rest can’t – and is shocked to find that the boat is covered in tentacles – that stretch farther than she can see. Are they being held by some sort of massive creature? Perhaps, but the more pressing concerns is the strange, unknown larva in their drinking water – which they see has no good effects on human pretty quickly.
The film was made, and played the festival circuit last year, but certainly the current situation helps to give the film added resonance. Siobhan is smart enough to know that they have no idea what this larva is – and that it is deadly. There is a lot of talk about quarantine when (if) they are able to make it back to shore – which will certainly get under the skin of people living in 2020, as it mirrors the conversations we are currently having.
The film wasn’t made on a large budget – but Hardiman and company make the most of it. The special effects are limited, but effective. What they do better is to slowly turn the screws on the crew – ratcheting up the tension, as the inevitable starts happening (remember the two films referenced above – they were for a reason). What makes the film interesting however is that you actually do care for the characters – Siobhan the most, but also everyone else. Hardiman doesn’t cheat here – she doesn’t just line the sheep up for the slaughter, but makes you care about the sheep first. She also has a terrific sense of atmosphere on board that boat. One hopes that in her next film, she perhaps tries to be more ambitious – Sea Fever works quite well, but you always know where it’s going, and it somehow feels a little smaller than it is. Still, it’s a fine debut from a very promising filmmaker.
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