Movie Review ~ The Moor

From the gothic romance of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights to the creeping horror of John Landis’ An American Werewolf in London, the Yorkshire moors have long been an eerie playground for forbidding tales.  Their fog-shrouded landscape, with its rural setting and age-old legends, lends itself nicely to British folk horror, a genre that has existed for decades yet manages to feel both timeless and contemporary.  Recently revived in films like The VVitch and Midsommar, the genre exploits haunting beauty thick with foreboding atmosphere.

Attempting to draw viewers into its misty embrace, The Moor trades in the same grim slow-burn descent into dread of its cinematic ancestors. Written by Paul Thomas and directed by Chris Cronin, this British production unfolds with a desolate menace for a while, using its ominous iconography and pagan influences to create a mood that’s chilly and, at times, frustratingly meandering. Endless drone shots of the terrain and a narrative given too much slack by its filmmakers ultimately keep it from being a destination you’ll want to revisit.

The film does open with a bang, though.  Claire uses her younger friend David to help her steal some sweets from the local shopkeeper in their small town when he is abducted, never to be seen again.  David joins several missing children in the area, and although a man is accused of the crime and imprisoned, the bodies are never discovered.  The only clue is that they might be on the vast moors.  Years later, an adult Claire (Sophia La Porta) is haunted by her tragic past, putting her grief to use in a podcast that investigates cold case crimes.

As the anniversary of David’s disappearance draws near, his father, Bill (David Edward-Robertson), asks her to join him in another search of the moors.  He believes he’s narrowed down where his son’s remains might be and wants her there not just because of her connection to the case but also for the publicity it could drum up.  As Claire delves deeper into the mystery, she’s joined in the search by Alex (Mark Peachey) and his daughter Eleanor (Elizabeth Dormer-Phillips), who possesses a psychic connection with the ghosts of the land.  Further support is provided by moor guide Liz (Vicki Hackett), and retired detective Thornley (the late Bernard Hill, in one of his last roles) who has never quite gotten over the details of the case.

The Brits have a knack for this type of sophisticated horror.  While not overly bloody, a hefty amount of country creep is on display, tapping into ancient otherworldly superstitions to unsettle the modern mind.  Sinister local lore provides the gateway to druidic symbolism, giving Cronin and cinematographer Sam Cronin a lot of negative space to play in.  The hallucinatory imagery is often nicely frightening, but eventually, you realize that much of it is conjured up in the editing bay, with the actors just running in circles on a patch of land.

La Porta and Edward-Robertson start the film on one level and remain there throughout.  Both deliver driven performances working toward the same goal, but it becomes a narrow-visioned approach via Thomas’ bloated script.  It’s Dormer-Phillips who steals the show, though, as a young woman cursed with a special gift.  The film’s most terrifying sequence, a descent into horror she can’t control, will linger with you long after an awkward transition to a disturbing finale.  She’s also part of a séance that rivals the one from The Changeling for the tingles it sends up the spine.

At nearly two hours, this scare-seeing trip feels overextended, with too many asides, flyover drone shots, and dead-end scenes that seem to be saying the same thing multiple times.  The frights are there, and they are well-staged, but the momentum often stalls right when you want it to accelerate into a gear aiming for higher stakes.  Its climax partly redeems its soggy midsection but also presents a head-scratching paradox that may irk viewers well-versed in otherworldly horror. Still, genre fans should find much to savor in The Moor, and it’s undeniable that Cronin has a command of tone when he employs it for all its unsettling glory.  I only wish there was a 90-minute cut that packs a more insidious punch.