A mother and daughter are suspected of witchcraft by their devout rural community.
Starring: Catherine Walker, Hannah Emily Anderson, Jessica Reynolds, and Jared Abrahamson
Directed and written by: Thomas Robert Lee
A Fantasia International Film Festival Review
“The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw” sets the stage for witchcraft to ruin another town. While the world has progressed, this group of settlers has kept to their original ways of living simple, going to church, and farming. It worked until the night of an eclipse about 17 years ago, and then everything changed for the worse. It seems like that was the night a curse was born, and the town’s suffering began.
Agatha Earnshaw has been keeping her daughter a secret of these 17 years, as her farm thrived leaving the town’s hate for her to grow. She spent all these years protecting Audrey Earnshaw (Jessica Reynolds) from the villagers, but after seeing her mom bullied by them Audrey decides it’s her time to protect mom. After the witches perform a creepy ceremony with Audrey, she asks one of them for help getting revenge. It’s the only time she really gets advice on being evil, but seems to do pretty well from this point on by herself. Her first target is Colm Dwyer (Jared Abrahamson) and his wife Bridget (Hannah Emily Anderson), who just lost their son.
True horror begins to set into the town, and not even the town’s priest Seamus (Sean McGinley) can stop it. Nothing is done in a hurry, as the people seem to have to suffer a little more before lives are lost. It’s sad to see for the settlers, but since the audience doesn’t get a lot of time with many of them it doesn’t hurt too much. More time is spent watching the Dwyer family suffer particularly Bridget. One of the most disturbing scenes involves Bridget and a sheep. Maybe she got tired of counting sheep!
As the suffering continues and Audrey’s power grows, the ultimate goal here is well hidden. Obviously there’s something especially evil about Audrey, but she seems to have a plan in motion early on that won’t come to light until the end. The final scene is sad for some, but for others they seem to get what they asked for. The town was doomed when the curse began, and the ending leaves the audience feeling that sense of dread is just beginning.
“The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw” gets off to an odd start mentioning that it’s 1973, but very much acting like it’s the 1800’s for the most part. The audience might forget that as time goes on, but for those that remember might feel like the settlers should have gotten out of Dodge while they could. However it’s good they stayed so the audience could enjoy the horror that Audrey conjures up on them. The film takes a nice pace so that the audience could take in her coming of age story, and be left with a dreadful feeling by the end. While the film isn't perfect, the sick side of me enjoyed what they did with the sheep scene, and I can’t believe I didn’t see what was coming in the final moments. With that said, I give the film 3 pools of blood, and won’t be counting sheep anytime soon!
HorrO
“The Curse of Audrey Shaw” is playing as part of the Fantasia 2020 Virtual Festival.
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