Review by Ben Bussey
What would you do if you knew it was your last day on Earth – indeed, the last day on Earth full stop? We tend to love our post-apocalyptic fantasies – in which, invariably, it is not life itself but the social order that has been eradicated – but movies which actually face the end of everything head-on are a little thinner on the ground. It’s not hard to see why; after all, seriously contemplating not only your own death but that of everyone you have ever known isn’t necessarily that good for shits and giggles. I haven’t seen Von Trier’s Melancholia just yet (and I can’t pretend I’m in any hurry to do so), but I gather it’s hardly laugh-a-minute stuff.
It probably won’t come as a surprise that The Devil’s Bargain isn’t exactly light-hearted entertainment either, given that it centres on a married couple (Chloe Farnworth and Jonnie Hurn) wandering alone through the countryside, who are not only awaiting death from above in the form of a big fuck-off asteroid, but are also struggling with the fall-out from a tragic accident which took their son a few years earlier. However, in setting the action back in the early 1970s, writer-director Drew Cullingham would seem to be not only addressing the eternal, unavoidable question of our own demise, but also the demise of the 60s dream, as our hippy protagonists find their faith in the ideals of peace, love and togetherness (not to mention their ideas about the soul, or lack thereof) sorely tested in their final hours – particularly once they are joined by a third party (Dan Burman) who proves to be more than he initially seems.
As I remarked when we posted the trailer for The Devil’s Bargain back in December, I wasn’t going into this film with especially high expectations, given Drew Cullingham was previously responsible for the very poor Umbrage: the First Vampire. Credit where it’s due, then: The Devil’s Bargain is not in any way a predictable follow-up to that rather derivative, poorly-realised B-movie horror. First off, it’s clearly nowhere near as commercial a premise, and doesn’t neatly conform to any genre conventions. Unsurprisingly given its period setting, it does somewhat evoke the British cinema of the era, with distinct echoes of Michael Reeves, Nicholas Roeg and Ken Russell; and given that, by all accounts, it was a shoestring production made on a tight schedule, it certainly does look and sound good, the camera keeping close to the actors most of the time, boosting a sense of claustrophobia despite the wide-open spaces in which the action takes place.
All this sets The Devil’s Bargain up as something with great potential. However, things don’t necessarily develop in the most interesting way. Given the big philosophical questions about life, the universe and everything which invariably come up when contemplating the end, I suppose it was inevitable that this winds up being a very dialogue-heavy film indeed, and given the smallness of the cast it often feels more theatrical than cinematic – not that this is necessarily a problem, particularly given that Chloe Farnworth and Jonnie Hurn both turn in very good performances. The real problem, on pretty much every level, is Dan Burman’s character. First off, Burman’s performance really pales in comparison with his co-stars, coming off very forced and unnatural (though again, the excessively verbose nature of Cullingham’s script has to carry a lot of the blame there). But really, it’s the character himself, and his role in the narrative, that is the real problem. Without giving too much away, it turns out he isn’t quite the perfect stranger he is at first presented as being, and the wedge he drives into the central relationship sends the whole thing spiralling away from the grander questions of mortality into rather more mundane, soap opera-ish melodrama; a series of revelations clearly intended to intensify matters in fact only serve to cheapen it all.
Speaking of cheapening matters – my final complaint relates not to the film itself, but the manner in which it has been marketed, Cullingham having emphasised the production’s alleged motto “no money, no clothes, no fear,” whilst publicity materials ‘warn’ the reader that the film contains full frontal nudity. Seriously now… it’s 2014. Everyone and their mother have seen more explicit things than this, possibly with their mother in the room at the time. Okay, so the cast spend a fair bit of time (not the duration, I might add) with their clothes off, but this is hardly Nine Songs or anything; male members remain flaccid, and penetration shots notably absent. The sad thing is, selling The Devil’s Bargain this way really serves to misrepresent how the film handles the nudity and sex. Again, given that Umbrage: the First Vampire featured female nudity which decidedly was on the exploitative side, I suspected Cullingham might follow suit here – but I’m happy to say he really doesn’t. The nude scenes are not handled in a voyeuristic fashion, and Chloe Farnsworth is not subjected to any more or less physical scrutiny than her male co-stars.
All in all, I do feel that The Devil’s Bargain isn’t as good as it might have been – but even so, there’s no denying it’s an admirable break from the norm, making a concerted effort to do something that challenges the audience, and doing so in a visually interesting manner. It’s deeply flawed, no doubt about it – but it has its shrivelled, black, pessimistic heart in the right place.
Learn more at The Devil’s Bargain website and Facebook page – and/or watch the film below.