A Wounded Fawn (Travis Stevens, 2022)
phantasmagoric -[ fan-taz-muh-gawr-ik, -gor- ], adjective.
having a fantastic or deceptive appearance, as something in a dream or created by the imagination.
having the appearance of an optical illusion, especially one produced by a magic lantern.
changing or shifting, as a scene made up of many elements.
Every once in a while, something comes along to remind audiences of the possibilities in the cinematic medium. If, like me, you watch a fair number of films and other varieties of filmic or cinematic narrative, including television, the memory that this is a creative medium with few limitations can start to seem far away. This isn't to say I don't love more traditional narratives or ways of approaching them. I do, absolutely. Sometimes though, it can seem or feel a little stale, and not because any of those films aren't well made, but just because there's a certain sense of mystery, of danger and discovery that starts to slip away, for no reason other than familiarity with the narrative structures and the traditional visual styles. Even if I don't know exactly where a story is going, I know when to expect the different beats the particular genre or narrative structure are prone to. It's rare to genuinely not know where the film is going or why it is where it is at a given moment.
Then, something comes along and it almost feels like it's virtually screaming in an attempt to remind us how expansive the medium can be, how much it can actually contain and how many ways there are to tell a story, in terms of narrative elements and visual style. A Wounded Fawn is one of those films. Even as some of its inspirations are pretty clear, it feels like a wholly new piece of work, as its creators were reveling in the possibilities. You can practically feel that even as its low budget created limitations, they were energized by the attempts to find creative ways to overcome them.
One of the beautiful things about independent film generally, and certainly horror, is that the smaller budgets tend to give filmmakers more creative freedom. They are less likely have to contend with the expectation that their film is going to play in every multiplex in the country in order to make a profit, so they aren't expected to deliver films which are based on those very standard narrative and visual styles. Independent and low budget horror aren't solely the realm of blood, guts and gore, despite their reputation. A Wounded Fawn has its share of gore, but that's not the focus. There are films which are primarily relying on the magic trick of the practical effects to be the thing keeping audiences hooked and keeping them interested in taking the rest of the journey. A Wounded Fawn isn't interested in anything even close to that simple. It's taking it's cues from the Italian giallos in using gore as one element of a larger magic trick, a distraction from a larger mystery the journey through the films narrative is going to illuminate, and as a color in the pallet of the overall experience that comes from watching.
In a way, A Wounded Fawn is looking into the past, to see the way into the future. It looks into the past through its style, very reminiscent of Italian giallo and the horror films of the 1970's more generally, and then narratively, reaches far further back than that. At the same time, it's painting a picture of a possible future. It's acting as revenge tale, wish fulfillment and aspirational call to a cultural memory as a hope for the future. It's first half is all too real, for reasons which have been well documented and explored, and still, we haven't put in the hard work to change that reality.
It uses phantasmagoric imagery as the bridge bringing together the present and the past, in order to ask questions of that possible future. What it's addressing is outside of time, both narratively and thematically. These are things that exist outside of time, and as a result, have intruded into lives no matter when they've taken place. By reaching into the past, it brings a power for accountability into the present, and through this kind of wish fulfillment, revenge narrative, it asks us what we want from our future. How long do we want to keep struggling with this grand narrative? How long are we going to need this power from the past to be responsible for bringing accountability into the present?
The danger is, very literally, in men's heads and needs to be removed.
It all feels so unusual and alien, specifically because it's using the variety of lurid subject matter which is rarely expected to address anything of substance, and is treated as too "low brow" to be "important art." This isn't Oscar bait. It's not costumed in prestige trappings. It's dressed up as the kind of film which would have been shown on 42nd Street in a long dead New York City, in the grindhouses between the porn theaters or that sometimes doubled as porn theaters. It's interested in being art that lives in and comes from the gutter, remarking on the tools which have allowed so much to be the same from the time it reaches back to, into the time it exists in. It's not a coincidence the film begins in and draws from the world of the most exclusive, "high art."
Writer Nathan Faudree and co-writer/director Travis Stevens are clearly influenced and inspired by Argento, Jodorowsky, Cronenberg, and Lynch, all of whom have at one point or another dabbled in some sense of the spiritual/cosmic as an equalizer or avenger. At different points, A Wounded Fawn recalls the experience of seeing the early and/or primary works from those directors, who also brought serious artistic ambitions to work considered too lurid for either the general public or as "legitimate art," but who went on to considered among the most visionary filmmakers in genre and whose work has inspired almost endless scholarship.
A Wounded Fawn is a great film. Josh Reuben and Sarah Lind are both excellent, bringing just the perfect amount of uncanny to their performances in this deranged, surreal reality the film constructs, and both showing creative courage in committing so fully to it. Ksusha Genenfeld is taking the small budget this film has and imbuing it with a genuine sense of magic and the cosmic through the cinematography. The design and art direction are stellar. This is not going to be a film everyone is going to love, but it's certainly a film genre fans should see, if for no other reason than to be reminded how few limitations there really are on the medium, and in turn, genre filmmaking.
It's exciting to be reminded of just how much is possible, and why it's important to remember.