Tuesday, October 16, 2012

CIFF 2012: The Citadel



In an unnamed desolate Irish neighborhood, a young couple are preparing to leave their condemned public housing high rise. They are looking for a more hopeful future as she is pregnant. As Tommy gets in the elevator to go down, his wife is attacked by some creepy faceless kids in hooded sweatshirts, who seem to want her unborn child. She dies but the baby is saved.

As a result, Tommy has become paranoid and fearful of leaving his new but equally bad public housing apartment. He barricades himself and his baby inside and can barely force himself out to attend therapy sessions to confront his fear and agoraphobia. At his wife's funeral, he meets an angry priest who seems to know something of the creatures who killed his wife. A caring nurse tries to help Tommy.

Later the priest reveals that the creatures are people who have been infected by the evil of the high rise, turning into zombie-ish creatures who prey on those on whom they smell fear. With the help of a blind boy, who appears to be one of those creatures but has been helping the priest, they are shielded from the blind creatures' smell and are able to escape.

The story is mostly in the horror vein with religious aspects, although as you can see it deals a bit with societal problems. The story does not tell us how and why Tommy and his wife are living alone with no other family or friend's support. I made up a backstory of perhaps them running away together in a teen romance and then being confronted with the harsh realities of life.

The actor who played Tommy was pretty believable. His body language, also described in the film, shows how he behaves like a victim and thus tends to invite bullying. But with the incentive of saving his baby and to a lesser extent the blind boy, Tommy is able to overcome his fear.

The filmmaker was in attendance and the story came from his own life experience when he too was attacked by a gang of younger kids, and he too suffered from agoraphobia as a result.

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