John and the Hole (2021); A Child’s Fantasy or an Eerie Nightmare? (Review)

Following its UK premiere at Frightfest, Vertigo Releasing’s John and the Hole is released in cinemas and digitally as the latest in the growing trend of indie arthouse horror. Nicolas’ Giacobone adapts his own short story, ‘El Pozo’ (approximately translated to ‘The Well’) with collaborator Pascual Sisto making his directorial debut. It stars Charlie Shotwell as the titular John, a thirteen-year-old boy who lives with his family in a big house in the woods. He discovers an abandoned bunker and begins to plan a way for him to gain his own independence: drugging his family and abandoning them in the bunker while he can live every kid’s fantasy of having a house all to himself.

While the synopsis may sound on the quirky side, the film is played entirely straight, but unlike Yorgos Lanthimos, which this film has been compared to, there is little sense of absurdity or dramatic tension from the situation. We just simply watch it play out in front of us. The filmmaking is controlled and clinical which leads to some chilling moments such as John looking out the window at a rainstorm that his family are unprotected from. Shotwell does well in playing John’ single-minded focus on making his dream come true and is an unsettling presence in these moments.

Horror through implication is the film’s greatest strength, but in making John so guarded throughout, it falls into the pitfall of any arthouse horror of becoming slow and ponderous. There’s an effective tension to be had in creating a feeling of uncertainty, but the film feels like it is lacking a straightforward hook. It is content to observe, meandering through the innocuous interactions and build to what is ultimately an anti-climax. This strange tone is best evident in an early scene where John asks his mother (Jennifer Ehle) and father (Michael C. Hall) about the bunker, where it is hard to tell if they are being cagey or if it’s just stilted dialogue. John has such a privileged upbringing in this white middle-to-upper class household that it is difficult to understand why he resents it so much, no matter how overprotective his parents are about his life. As such, there’s a strange lack of stakes where nothing that happens has any real consequences.

For all the evident artistry on display, there is also a lack of originality. The concept of a children’s fantasy of being an adult without parents around is presented as unnerving but it does so by borrowing from other better films, such as when John finds it easier to impersonate his mother’s voice over the phone than his father, reminiscent of Norman Bates in Psycho but with less interest in exploring this particular mother-son dynamic. She provides the only suggestion for John’s motive for imprisoning them in her recollection of a conversation they had about what it’s like being an adult. John showed disappointment in her description of being like ‘a kid with more responsibilities’ which suggests he is trying to prove her wrong. This concern is barely expressed by John himself though beyond a brief moment where he stresses, “I want to be who I am” but this theme of identity and coming of age feels like a statement rather than something adequately explored.

This theme also leads to jarring scenes between a mother and daughter who are completely separate from the narrative. In fact, the daughter asks her mother to tell the story of John and the Hole and escalates to a level of absurdity that is at odds with the rest of the film. It suggests an interesting idea that we are watching a fable but nothing else in the film supports this idea so it sticks out like a sore thumb.

Mark Kermode described this film as ‘not for everyone’ and it is possible that it just didn’t chime for me as it would with others. I found its ideas interesting and there’s clear talent on display from direction, performance, score and production, but ultimately it played it too safe to fully impact me.

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THANKS FOR READING MIKE’S REVIEW OF JOHN AND THE HOLE

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