Given the success of Get Out a few years ago, it was inevitable that we’d get a few follow-up, socially conscious horror movies. Likewise, it was inevitable that some of these would fall short of Get Out: it turns out that balancing a political message with elements of fantasy is not all that easy to get right. This brings us to The Welder (2021), a film which unfortunately doesn’t get this right; in trying to tackle racism, it seems to hunker down, hanging on to the kinds of oddball attitudes it purports to critique. It’s not without ideas, for sure, and it looks great throughout. However, my resounding feeling, come the end, was a kind of mortified confusion.
With quite an abrupt beginning, commencing with some sleepwalking and a partial flashback to an as-yet unknown traumatic event, we meet Eliza (Camila Rodríguez), ex-Army (we know this because she has ‘ARMY’ printed on her shirt in the flashback). Her boyfriend Roe (Roe Dunkley) retrieves her from the porch, where she has wandered; the next day, they discuss what’s best to do and decide a holiday at a remote ranch would be the best course of action. They pack and head off, with their dialogue establishing and re-establishing the fact that this place is Secluded (a similar thing happens in the script when they try and fail to access the Wi-Fi, though that comes later.)
They arrive at their destination. Sadly, it seems that the person we’ve seen in short cut scenes throwing pieces of raw flesh around is the proprietor, but he greets them politely enough and introduces himself. This is William Godwin – no relation to Mary Shelley – and he takes a particular interest in the pair, not least because they are mixed race; Godwin’s wife was herself black, which seems to make him feel kinship with Eliza and Roe. Godwin has a companion in the almost-catatonic but otherwise benign Don (Cristian Howard), who helps him manage the estate; if he knows any more details about whatever tragedy befell Godwin’s wife, then he isn’t saying so yet.
What we do know is that Godwin has made it his life’s business to ‘eradicate racism’. Fair enough, it’s a well-intentioned aim, even if one person working alone on a ranch in the middle of nowhere would have limited influence, you’d think. But then you discover how he plans on achieving this aim, and – well, you wouldn’t credit it. It would be great to discuss it here, but that would spoiler the film’s key plot point, the single thing the film deems worth hanging onto. So let’s just refer back to the film’s title, and leave your imaginations to run with it. (Some of the press literature dispenses altogether with worrying about spoilers, mind you, so beware.)
There are good features here. Director David Liz’s experience as a cinematographer shines through in how the film looks: aesthetically, it’s rock solid, with great locations, aerial shots, great lighting and composition – the technical prowess is all there. However, atmosphere alone cannot sustain a film entirely, and in many respects it is peculiar. There are strange disparities in how the dialogue is delivered, with Roe seeming to overdeliver his lines as Rodríguez barely gets hers out; there are some odd moments of comic relief here, which don’t quite marry together with the rest of the film, which is otherwise a protracted, but still rather flat affair: glances are held too long, incidental music blares, quick edits dominate, but there feels like too little plot here, right up until the lurch towards a big, bizarre reveal. If this unsettled, shifting effect is deliberate, then it’s a success. Everything feels off.
All in all, The Welder is an attractive film which overreaches, either scrimping on the narrative and character development, or changing tack altogether, offering up something too preposterous to fit into the film as a whole. It’s likely that this is all coming from a place of compassion, and let’s assume that it is, but in trying to cram a weak social message into a barely-realised horror story, it simply underlines its own flaws. If the film is critiquing a well-meaning but piecemeal attempt to tackle racist attitudes with a well-meaning, piecemeal attempt to tackle racist attitudes, then that simply reiterates the issues, rather than advancing any meaningful exploration.
The Welder (2021) will screen on November 2nd as part of the Raindance Film Festival. For more details on the festival, please click here.