Being a man of God means to be a man of principle as you follow and conform to the path that the man above wishes you to uphold. As we face temptation and lust, it’s the power of God that should theoretically help us survive these sins to live a perfect life in his image. However, there’s one crucial enemy that many forget about when living and pushing back against sin: ourselves. Eric Pennycoff’s The Leech tells the story of a devoted priest who faces his greatest challenge yet: human beings.
The Leech follows Father David (Graham Skipper) who devotes his life to his struggling church while attempting to reach out to people through social media and rap music with the help of his friend, Rigo (Rigo Garay). One day after an especially quiet service just before Christmas, David finds a man named Terry (Jeremy Gardner) sleeping on a pew within the church and as he asks him to leave, his gracious nature leads to David offering him a place to stay. What begins as a friendly gesture quickly turns sour as Terry brings his girlfriend, Lexi (Taylor Zaudtke) into David’s home and their ignorant ways take a toll on the holy man’s life.
… when the film takes a breath and focuses on its three central and very different characters contrasting from one another in one isolated location, it’s a really fun time and a worthy inclusion to both the Christmas and religious horror subgenre.
There’s a fine line between two genres that The Leech walks between as a film. As a comedy, there’s a certain sense of sadistic humour buried within the film as we witness David’s boiling rage as he attempts to deal with the sinful life that Terry lives day to day. As Terry plays metal music with vulgar lyrics as loud as humanly possible and indulges in alcohol and drugs, there’s a surprising amount of relatability that David brings forward as the main character as you’re able to share in his frustration as a stranger takes over what is supposed to be a safe and private space. However, this relatability factor begins to shift and rot as the darker side of David’s devoted character begins to show itself. Locked inside David is a man who is remorseful of the direction his life has taken but the mere thought of him regretting his path with God leads to David becoming terrified of the man above and perhaps even his own mother whose painting consistently watches over him and his every move. Despite living in a large home and owning a large church, David is an isolated soul and for some, isolation leads to deadly consequences. As a comedy, The Leech never stops being funny but the character of David opens the door to some extremely interesting moments of psychological horror. For many, that’s a hard balance to work around but thanks to Pennycoff’s mostly confident screenplay, The Leech gets by. However, it does have somewhat of a pacing issue.
With a runtime of about 82 minutes, The Leech is a film that seeks to get everything it wants to say out there as quickly as possible and for the most part, it does a strong job of doing so. However, there’s a feeling of sluggishness as it reaches its endpoint and ramps up the stakes as well as its pacing as much as possible. When the film focuses on its smaller-scale feeling and lets the characters breathe and interact with each other, it’s a funny and engaging Christmas tale with a gleefully sadistic sense of dark humour. While The Leech ramping up near the end isn’t a bad thing, the short runtime leads to the ending feeling abrupt and at odds with the energy its first half beautifully builds.
The Leech suffers from a rushed finale and some confused pacing overall but when the film takes a breath and focuses on its three central and very different characters contrasting from one another in one isolated location, it’s a really fun time and a worthy inclusion to both the Christmas and religious horror subgenre.
The Leech is out now on Arrow Video Blu-Ray
