Seasoned horror fans can be hard to impact upon. The Saw franchise is still in rude health because there are folk completely desensitized to its vicious violence who treat the movies like a hot cup of cocoa on a chilly October day. That makes it much harder to impress with every horror film that comes out, and in some cases, there’s undoubtedly a lament on the wind of ”it was better when I was younger” even if that’s a daft thing to say.
Yes, that paragraph is somewhat relevant to me. So when a horror movie comes along and provides moments of unexpected shock and terror, it feels so special. For me, When Evil Lurks is a fine modern example of that. Its qualities reach beyond mere shock value, but having the power to stun me with a scene’s sudden nastiness genuinely is a rarity I will always be excited to discover, and this movie has that power.
When Evil Lurks is director Demián Rugna’s follow-up to the unsettling scare fest Terrified (no, not the clown movie). In a rural village, two brothers stumble upon a local man whom a demonic presence has infested. It’s quickly apparent that while the victim is shocking to look at, the characters are pretty accepting of this fact, and as we learn, the world When Evil Lurks operates in has long been dealing with demonic possessions.
They are treated as a virus because they can spread Evil with a capital E if people don’t follow the correct procedures. In a place this remote, this phenomenon is unheard of, so what can the brothers do to stop it from ruining the value of their land? Naturally, the story leads us to a place where rules aren’t followed, and things go incredibly bad.
Its ingredients seem familiar, but Rugna seasons them with a secret sauce that enhances the flavor of almost every aspect of When Evil Lurks. That sauce is made up of unrelenting, uncaring bleakness.
I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase ”nobody is safe!” used in relation to hyping a TV show or movie, but Rugna is clearly an advocate for seeing that through in When Evil Lurks. Whereas you’d usually be able to see a route to salvation in the narrative structure of a horror film with a lot of death and destruction, When Evil Lurks is shrouded in a Fog of War, ready to ruin your day at a second’s notice.
Even when something truly awful is telegraphed at one point, the way Rugna executes the actual outcome is so sudden and vicious that it left me open-mouthed and staring aghast for a good 30-40 seconds.
These moments wouldn’t work half as well if we didn’t have a concerted effort to give us a detailed background on the demonic plague’s history and its place in the world, from an intriguing set of rules that don’t follow the typical sort of path for a demonic possession movie. The world is already on the cusp of dying, and somehow, those left can be ignorant and uncaring of the situation until it smacks them in the face (literally, in some cases). Rugna is as adept at escaping traditional ideas of demonic possession as his possessed are at wriggling into the flesh of the living.
Then there’s the demonic presence itself. Aside from an early grotesque example, the possessed don’t transform into something monstrous unless they’ve been horribly mutilated beforehand. Their power comes from how they speak. No guttural snarls and ancient language, just deceptive, manipulative speeches intended to steer the situational advantage to their masters’ continuing existence.
The influence points are clear and crucially, fit the vision. John Carpenter’s Apocalypse trilogy (specifically Prince of Darkness) comes to mind, as does Lucio Fulci’s apocalyptic outing City of the Living Dead. Evil Dead is another that feels obvious, but mainly the modern films, and if I were to trace that part of the mood back anywhere, it would be something like Brian Keene’s demon zombie novel The Rising.
There are very telling nods to the attitudes of a population in the midst of a viral outbreak (more than once, characters let out baffled snorts of derision at the idea of a demonic outbreak happening in their town). You’ll be unsurprised to read that, one way or another, they learn their lesson. Human ignorance, indifference, and stupidity leading to the growth of Evil? What a wild story.
Central to selling the dread of a near-dead world are the two brothers, played by Ezequiel Rodríguez and Demián Salomón. Their natural chemistry gives us a relatable human element throughout, but it’s fair to say Rodríguez is the viewer’s emotional anchor. We’re along for the ride as he runs the full gauntlet of emotions during the nearly 100-minute runtime. He made convincing work of the increasingly bleak situation, and his subplot of a fractured history with his ex-wife and children gives the movie’s fire its largest fuel source.
Such unrelenting bleakness can be seen as unpalatable, but much of what makes Rugna’s film an uncomfortable watch lies outside the more obvious examples of extreme violence and harrowing consequences—the air of When Evil Lurks’ world is thick with decay and despair. So much so that it almost seems to radiate out of the screen and into your pores. It’s fitting that an unseen oppressive force is something that can be felt by both the audience and the characters during this movie.
When Evil Lurks is a superb slab of unrelenting apocalyptic horror that turns the possession movie formula on its head, it evokes the doomy mood perfected by the likes of Fulci and Carpenter. Still, thanks to its grounded human story and almost rhythmic timing for moments of pure shock and awe, it is much more than its influences.
Score: 9 – Excellent
As ComingSoon’s review policy explains, a score of 9 equates to ”Excellent”. Entertainment that reaches this level is at the top of its type. The gold standard that every creator aims to reach.
