A low-budget thriller that creeps up on you until you find yourself carnally engrossed, Wake Wood offers slime-glistening birth scenes, violent deaths, and the moral lesson that when people die they should stay dead. There’s plenty of pathos here, and ritualistic remote village paganism. Both viscerally connect viewers to one undeniable truth: how deeply parents can love their children.
Between flashbacks and solace-seeking slices of life in a small rural village–appropriately named Wake Wood–we’re introduced to a young professional couple trying to come to grips with the tragic and violent loss of their nine-year old daughter Alice (Ella Connolly). Veterinarian Patrick Daly (Aidan Gillen) and his pharmacist wife Louise (Eva Birthistle) are still in pain and find it difficult to deal with the daily reminders of their loss.
Early on, Wake Wood foreshadows what’s to come as Patrick skillfully performs a Caesarian section on a cow. When Arthur (Timothy Spall) the village elder takes an interest in the young couple’s grief, we sense a sinister undertone that beguiles them to consider an “alternative” to their suffering. This dovetails nicely with a woman who enters Louise’s shop accompanied by a freakishly disturbed teen with a ghastly pallor. Three days later, the teen is paraded out of the village by a cultish group playing wood clicking drums. Patrick and Louise are told that the village elders of Wake Wood have a solution to their grief. Of course, there are promises to be made and consequences if they’re not kept. Severe consequences.
The Daly’s finally agree to all terms. But they weren’t completely honest with the village elders, and as those accustomed to these tales will tell you: never lie when you make a pact with stewards of the undead. The film exploits the birthing motif, uniting it with a pagan ritual of mud that creates life from death—if only temporarily.
Keating milks everything he can out of his actors and locations. There are plenty of foreboding glances, knowing smirks and dialog-free moments that communicate more than could be said. The unspeakable is clearly not spoken of, yet viewers get a sense of what’s to come—a Money’s Paw arrangement that goes horribly bad for the Dalys and several of the villagers. Then there’s the creepy atmospherics created by the massive wind turbines on the outskirts of Wake Wood. They are the sentinels that guard Wake Wood from the infidels who violate its covenants. Relentlessly churning like giant demon heartbeats, they perform a unique function far beyond simply juicing the village with power.
Wake Wood is clearly a film whose death scenes are far less disturbing than its depiction of bizarre births. Animal husbandry serves as a metaphor for the violence of birth and the abrupt finality of death–as when a stun gun is used to kill a bull or when a Caesarian section draws life out of spilt blood. It’s all wrapped up nicely in a Hitchcockian ending we had an inkling was coming.
Alex A. Kecskes is a published author of "Healer a Novel" and "The Search for Dr. Noble"—both now available on Amazon. He has written hundreds of film reviews and celebrity interviews for a wide variety of online and print outlets. He has covered red carpet premieres and Comic-Con events for major films and independent releases.
