The Harrowing is a 2018 thriller about a detective determined to discover the truth about the death of his partner, going undercover into a forensic hospital.
It’s sort of curious how many movies get their start or motivations from a cop losing their partner to some act of violence that is later weighted as guilt by our hero, per se. With writer/director Jon Keeyes‘ latest thriller The Harrowing, that’s where we’re at again, though it’s not one partner but a couple. Either way, this twisty mix of cops and corpses has its motivations in the right place, led by a sturdy turn from its star, even if there’s a number of genre flaws that keep it reigned in.
After veteran cop Ryan Calhoun (Matthew Tompkins) steps out of the room to call in the bust at a child sex trafficking ringleader’s home, it gets his partner murdered, and him a reputation. Not long after, he’s back on the job with an old friend and fellow detective, and once again, he steps out of a sting operation to grab a coffee and returns to find his crew in the sting room hacked to bits and his partner gnawing on the intestines of one of the bodies. Naturally, he shoots him dead and is then taken off the case by his Lieutenant, Logan (Michael Ironside). Convinced he’s seeing demons, he starts his own investigation, and with Logan’s help, gets himself admitted to a psych ward where he goes undercover under the care of a shifty doctor (Arnold Vosloo) and discovers maybe reality isn’t what it seems.
Keeyes is balancing two distinct genres on close ends of a pivot, tracking a murder mystery and delving into the supernatural. Both have some weight though neither are explored quite to the depths they might, the story mostly working toward its finale while sticking to identifiable landmarks that purposely avoids any shades of grey. This is a singular premise that stacks its cards right where they need to be, with dialogue that exposits what we need and contrivances that allow Ryan (and by extension, us) connect dots with little resistance.
That’s not all bad of course. As a cop story it might not have legs to stand on, but as a genuine creepy mystery, it has a lot more going for it. We’re meant to question what Ryan is experiencing and it’s no surprise that what begins as a controlled investigation quickly spirals into conspiracy. What is real and what is not? It manages to set some hooks that hold, even if there’s a few too many sudden jerks awake from ‘nightmares’.
Tompkins holds his own with the whole affair, the movie better the more it falls into its own cryptic madness, although there are plenty of over-ripe performances from the rest of the cast. Either way, while fans of Leonardo Dicaprio‘s Shutter Island might find some parallels, there’s enough here to keep it its own. Some interesting color choices and direction, along with a decent score help keep this a step above the standard, not to mention some last act visual effects that will surely please the gore hounds. The Harrowing knows what it wants to be and does exactly that.
A Second Opinion on The Harrowing
The worst kind of demons in this world aren’t the ones that dwell beneath the crust of the Earth and possess human bodies to do with them as they please, they are the ones that already live inside us. The Harrowing from director Jon Keeyes (American Nightmare) explores the reality of demons that hinder the human psych and cause us to become the monsters that we really are.
After witnessing the brutal murder of his best friend and partner in crime, undercover detective Ryan becomes haunted and obsessed by what happened on that fateful night. It becomes his goal to discover the truth surrounding the murders of that distressing evening and there’s only one way he can truly do that; by going undercover in a psychiatric hospital. Once confined to the walls of the madness, Ryan begins to understand that demons could be real and the cause for the murder.
Most demon films are heavily focused on the monsters themselves; we see them from the beginning and follow their plight. However in The Harrowing we are going a journey with detective Ryan into his own personal Hell and finding out the secrets that he has lurking in his mind. Played by Matthew Tompkins (Sicario), Ryan goes through one awful experience into the next – at the very beginning of the film his work partner is murdered when an undercover job goes wrong, then his best friend/new partner is horrifically murdered in a shocking scene that is exceptionally gory. This is where our first glimpse of the demon is, and the costume department truly have encompassed what a flesh consuming demon should look like when conjured from our minds to the screen.
This film doesn’t rely solely on gore tactic to keep the viewer entertained, even though they do add some bloody substance. As soon as Ryan is checked into the psychiatric ward, the atmosphere becomes darker and darker with a lot of mysticism surrounding everything that happens. With a runtime of just under two hours, there would usually be a worry that we wouldn’t be stuck to our seats and become agitated and fidgety around the 80 minute mark. The Harrowing keeps us guessing from beginning until the very end – are the demons real or are they something imagined by Ryan’s mind which has seen disturbing crime scenes, and been left scarred from the things that have happened? Post traumatic stress disorder does strange things to those who have lived through them, and therefore we toss and turn with the possibility that everything we are witnessing alongside Ryan could be a delusion of his mind… Yet we were there from the beginning and know his character and it seems difficult to believe that we could have been being deceived all along.
Stylishly put together, shot well and with scenes that all feel coherent to the gripping storyline, The Harrowing is an independent film that has been produced with knowledge behind it. Although there was nothing mind-blowing about this film, it seems like it will garner a cult following of those who want the telling of a psychological horror paired with the monstrosity of demons and the blood and gore from splatter and extreme films. It’s a culmination of different genre types all bundled into one film that makes it well worth the watch and enjoyable for nearly every horror fan.
The Harrowing releases December 25.