In recent years, a handful of very different films – The Hollow, The Hole in the Ground, the remake of Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark – have tackled the legends of the folkloric ‘little people’ who are more prone to steal babies than offer pots of gold. Jon Wright’s last Irish-made film was the cheerfully boozy alien invasion picture Grabbers; Unwelcome is closer in tone to his earlier, darker essay on bullying and revenge, Tormented.
Heavily pregnant Maya (Hannah John-Kamen) and her husband Jamie (Douglas Booth) bounce back from a home invasion in grim London when Jamie inherits a property in the wilds of Ireland… though both have unresolved issues. Maya is gently advised she should leave raw liver by the garden gate as an offering and there are mutterings about a sixty-year-old tragedy. However, the couple’s real problems kick off when they need a local builder to fix a hole in the roof and obvious bad ‘un Daddy (Colm Meaney) shows up with his trio of menacing adult kids. For a stretch, the film back-burners the ‘redcaps’ to play the Straw Dogs game of locals giving incomers an escalating hard time, with an added edge of Irish ant-English sentiment. However, at a particularly bad moment, Maya asks for help… and chattering, sharp-toothed, knife-wielding goblins pitch in, albeit with their own not-exactly-hidden agenda.
Unwelcome is oddly structured – there’s a narrative hiccough halfway through as a key offscreen scene is described only to be shown in grainy flashback a few minutes later – and has an unusual stylised, hi-def look. It’s a toss-up as to whether the Irish or English stereotypes are broader – it comes down to a conflict between evil blarney and seething wimpishness – and several story beats depend on characters being complete dolts. But the suspense works and the mix of grue, cruelty and eccentric wit is distinctive.
Unwelcome is released in cinemas on 27 January 2023