When I first heard about Baatar Batsukh’s Aberrance, I was intrigued to see what precisely a Mongolian horror/thriller could be. The opening act showed plenty of promise, but things unfortunately spiraled out of control very quickly after that.
When city dwellers Erkhmee (Erkhembayar Ganbat) and Selenge (Selenge Chadraaba) arrive at an old cabin deep in the Mongolian wilds, a foreboding settles over the couple. Erkhmee’s seemingly keen desire to provide a safe and nurturing space for his artistic wife is at odds with the violent actions and mannerisms their quizzical neighbor observes. As the neighbor digs deeper for the reason behind this aberrant behavior, only more questions and trouble arise.
It’s fair to say Aberrance is frontloaded with its best ideas. The title cards are really well done, and the slow but steady buildup of the intensity surrounding Erkhmee and Selenge’s relationship held my attention. Questions and ambiguity were in the air from the off. Why is Erkhmee giving Selenge a space for her art so she can express herself if he’s so damn keen on controlling everything else in her life? The title tells you there’s something different from what’s perceived as normal going on here, and the signs point to a typical domestic abuse situation.
One of the intelligent things Batsukh’s film does to get you in the frame of mind Selenge is in with clever camera work. Connecting the camera’s focus to small points of intensity and hostility in the relationship ratchets up the unnerving atmosphere. During an uncomfortable conversation between a group of characters, the camera draws in on Selenge’s body, giving us a sense of the oppressive feeling in her situation.
A ticking clock slides into the soundtrack in more intense moments, alluding to the idea that things will escalate terribly. Sadly, it just goes for being terrible instead.
During the first act, this genuinely good camera work and relative ambiguity as to where the movie was going helped keep the whole thing at a promising level, but shortly after a revelation (the first of many), the story loses its ambiguity and unravels at an alarming pace.
Aberrance clocks in at a cool 75 minutes, and it initially felt like it would breeze by. But when that aforementioned point in the story comes, everything gets overburdened, nonsensical, and, dare I say, a little bit dull.
A big problem at this point is that Aberrance can’t decide what it’s about. Is it an allegory for depression? An Us vs. Them tale? A supernatural thriller? I can’t posit much more than that without spoiling the directions (plural) that Aberrance goes in, but it is safe to say it just spews forth multiple versions of where the film should go all at once and without the cohesion to unite its competing subplots. If they were in any way ambitious swings, it might be forgivable, but in reality, it’s a hodge-podge of tropes and tired ideas that don’t always belong in the film they’re inhabiting.
There are so many attempted twists in the back half of Aberrance, and only one actually works in tandem with the story being set up at the start. It then all ends with an almost entirely unsatisfying final revelation before dragging on for another ten minutes to give us one more unnecessary surprise. A post-credits scene is featured and is utterly unnecessary, and while I get the sentiment of dedicating the film to Darren Aronofsky because there are some moments that evoke the unpleasant unease of some of his work, such as mother! it ends up more punchline than praise.
I wish Aberrance had managed to stick to one solid plot point instead of scrambling about in a ball pit of bad ideas. There’s enough good in the way this movie begins to suggest there’s better to come from Batsukh.
Score: 4/10
As ComingSoon’s review policy explains, a score of 4 equates to “Poor.” The negatives outweigh the positive aspects making it a struggle to get through.
