AND SOON THE DARKNESS

Stephanie and Ellie are two American girls on vacation in Argentina. Having separated from the group of cyclists with whom they arrived in South America, they venture with their bikes into a small town in the interior of Córdoba, where they decide to stay overnight, ready to take the first bus the following morning. Due to Ellie's wild night, the two do not wake up in time to leave and are thus forced to stay an extra day in that country. Deciding to explore the area, they stop to sunbathe near the river. After a small argument, Stephanie separates from Ellie, but when she goes back to reconcile and return to the hotel, the girl no longer finds her friend. Now Stephanie must find Ellie before nightfall, otherwise there is a chance of losing all trace of the girl, since in that area some women have disappeared in the past without returning. Among the latest examples of that wave of remakes that for a decade has flooded American horror productions and is now slowly dying out, in 2010 there was also the remake of "The Monster of the Country Road". The beautiful and unfortunately little-remembered thriller that Robert Fuest directed in 1971 brought two English girls to enjoy an apparently tranquil bike ride in the French countryside, which soon turns into a nightmare under the sun, between kidnappings, murders, crazy psychopaths, and the omertà of the natives. In the remake, signed by the debutant Marcos Efron, the location changes: no longer the French countryside, but the Argentine interior. Perhaps because France would have offered a too postcard-like landscape and between vineyards and flowering meadows, it would have seemed unthreatening, or perhaps because South America is now cinematographically close to danger and horror, as demonstrated by "Rovine", "Borderland", and "Turistas", which chose those places, or even because filming in Argentina costs surely less than in France. Rather, it is beautiful to think that the choice of Argentina is more philological and cultured, as a land of "excellent disappearances" with the well-known issue of the Desaparecidos that stained the local chronicle at the end of the 70s and the beginning of the 80s. No explicit reference to those events, obviously, but it cannot be a coincidence that the place of tortures and disappearances for "political" purposes has become also in cinematic fiction a terrain of kidnappings and human trafficking. To Efron's film, which could easily have settled into the vein of blood-drenched tourist horrors that use the language of torture porn, credit must be given for the courage to completely distance itself from current cinematic trends and stage a film that adopts times and languages close to the film by Fuest to which it refers. It must be immediately clarified that "And Soon the Darkness" is not a true horror film, there is no blood, and violence gives way to a general sense of mystery and impotence, mainly due to being foreigners in a foreign land whose places, people, and language are barely known. This sense of mystery is effectively felt for three-quarters of the film, those more faithful to the original work, and the choice of some locations also seems undoubtedly well-chosen, such as the ghost town of Villa del Lago, which is a real abandoned city called Epecuén. In 1984, this city was completely flooded by the lake's waters, to be then revealed in the early 2000s when the water level, lowering, brought to light the ruins of the city. Then, when the screenwriters Marcos Efron and Jennifer Derwingston take a completely different route from the original, the film weakens and ends up resembling, in staging and themes, so many other films seen in recent years, from "Turistas", precisely, to "Shuttle". Interesting the idea of adding and merging with the main storyline of the two tourists also that of the mysterious character Michael, played by Karl Urban, who provides a different yet complementary viewpoint on the affair. Too bad that this narrative snippet is concluded prematurely and in a non-pregnant way, ultimately proving useless for the film's narrative economy. Excellent the choice of the two female leads Amber Heard (also producer) and Odette Yustman, who, in addition to undeniable aesthetic qualities fully valued by the director in more than one scene, are also very good and in perfect sync with the characters they portray. In short, "And Soon the Darkness" is a decent film that works for most of its duration, especially for a good atmosphere that functionally translates the film of which it is a remake, except to show itself "homologated" and rushed in the conclusion.