Some of your more expressionistic horror movies set their action in places and buildings that are already terrifying, be they gothic or rotted or in some other way sinister and dangerous. Others take a quieter, almost subliminal path, intentionally existing in locations that seem familiar and banal in order to make the monsters all the more unsettling for having invaded your sense of ordinariness. Andrew Semans‘ Resurrection opts for the latter path, taking place in the unremarkable office buildings and streets that could be found in almost any small city in North America. It’s the inside of a tortured mind that’s actually the scariest place to be.
That said, Semans does not allow Resurrection‘s setting to actually be anonymous. Wisely, he allows Albany to play itself. Too many movies try to make themselves relatable by wiping away the specificities of the town or city in which they were shot. This makes those movies feel like they’re set on an alien planet. In our world, maybe the only thing that every single place has in common is that they all exist on the map and have a name.
Albany, it turns out, was just as good a place as any for Margaret (Rebecca Hall) to relocate and start a new life in an attempt to outrun the trauma, both emotional and physical, of her late childhood and early adulthood. That plan works right up until the man responsible for her younger self’s suffering (Tim Roth) blithely shows up in town one day. Or, at least, he appears to. When Margaret confronts him in the park, he seems not to know who she is. Resurrection is one of those psychological thrillers where we’re kept in the dark about whether or not what’s happening to our protagonist is real or she’s losing her mind. Or, in a third option, she lost her mind years ago and there was never any hope.
Resurrection is, clearly, a bleak movie. Or, perhaps, it’s a movie about bleakness, a depiction of a life lived under the patriarchal suggestion that a woman’s happiness can only be found in submission and an agreement to limit herself and remain naïve, stupid and subservient.
Roth’s David, of course, represents those forces and the insidious ways they maintain their influence over the world. But it would be an insult to both him and Hall to boil their performances down to their allegorical pieces. Hall, in particular, has a monologue that, by definition, is simple exposition. But, unfolding entirely in one shot that holds on her face against a black background, it’s captivating, unnerving and one of the single most impressive feats of acting you’ll see in a movie all year. And that’s just her alone. For all its power and fury, the highest recommendation I can give Resurrection is that it’s a chance to see two of our finest actors elevate each other.
