Synopsis:
Running from grief after the mysterious death of his wife, Eric Black takes a job as a shepherd. Trapped alone on a majestic weather-beaten island with an ominous secret. One mans sudden, spiralling madness meets a vengeful supernatural force. What starts as the perfect wind-swept escape becomes a race to save his sanity and his life.
Shepherd wastes no time playing with subtle introductions and casual character interactions and instead begins in the deep end, or more accurately, the ocean. Our protagonist, Eric (Tom Hughes), is tortured by waking nightmares and is suffering from severe depression due to what we can assume to be the loss of his wife and unborn child. While the circumstances themselves are not—at the start of the film—revealed to us, we learn that Eric’s relationship with his wife came at the cost of his relationship with his family…and that he is now a man with little to nothing left. This whole opening act is powerfully acted and beautifully shot. The cinematography is particularly gorgeous and the ambience is both menacing and foreboding. The score is a symphony of scary cords and haunting hymns that couple really well with the cold, wet, English setting. It’s a whole mood, somewhere between murderous and melancholy.
Once Eric begins his work as the shepherd, the traditional slow-burn begins. This is more the pace that I was expecting from this genre of film…the quiet settings and haunting landscapes that are home to some kind of malevolent entity that drives our protagonist slowly out of his mind. What is real and what is imagined are both a mystery to the protagonist and the viewer alike. I adore this style of film; broody, artsy, eldritch terror in a haunted highland or secluded island, no annoying humanity in sight and only the ancient old ones for company. It’s like my favourite comfort food and I’m always hungry for more.
As we progress through the acts that follow, the film goes from good to better to hauntingly brilliant while our protagonist goes from melancholy to miserable to absolutely mental. It’s hard to tear into the details of what it is that makes the film genuinely great without dropping far too many spoilers and—in all honesty—the less you know going in, the more entertaining this one is going to be. What I can tell you is that the film is separated into chapters, each building on the tension of the last and each revealing slightly more of the purgatory-like world within which our film seems to be set. It’s an audio-visual feast, with a plethora of detailed cinematic sequences that look more like still paintings than they do shots from an indie production. These, coupled with what is probably the most haunting score I’ve come across this year, makes for a watch worth the wait. I was genuinely blown away.
The attention to the smallest of details is shockingly meticulous, with simple things like shadows, reflections, and creaking hulls made important, our attention often forcibly drawn to the film’s powerful imagery. There’s one scene with the sheep that had me in awe, a scene you’ll recognize the instant you see it—probably one of my favourite scenes from a horror film in the last decade. The acting was stellar and although the cast was very small, each added to the quality of the film rather than taking from it, which is a hard ask with an indie production. I enjoyed literally every scene, every minute, from the onset to the climax…and what a climax it was.
In all the years I’ve been reviewing horror films, this is easily one of the best that has found its way into my inbox and I am really grateful to have had the opportunity to share my thoughts on Shepherd–a wonderful offering to the horror genre. If you liked films like The VVitch (2015) or Antichrist (2009) or The Lighthouse (2019) then this is going to be right up there with those for you. Shepherd had its World Premiere at London Film Festival on 14th October and will be in UK cinemas from 12th November. Thanks for reading and as always, stay sordid. Don’t miss this one.
