Are you afraid? Aislinn Clarke’s claustrophobic horror “Fréwaka” just sold to Japan (Hakuhodo DY Music & Pictures Inc.) and Spain (Filmin).
“It’s great to see the response to ‘Fréwaka’ and the appreciation for smart horrors on the market. It seems that the exploration of the themes of Irish mythology and placing them in the contemporary setting makes it exciting and relevant for distributors across the world,” said Jan Naszewski of Poland’s sales outfit New Europe Film Sales, which is already in “advanced talks” with North America and U.K.
In the film – written and directed by Clarke, also behind “The Devil’s Doorway” – home care worker Shoo (Clare Monnelly) heads to a remote village to care for agoraphobic Peig (Bríd Ní Neachtain). It’s not an easy feat. Peig is terrified of the “Na Sídhe” – sinister entities who she believes abducted her decades before. As the two develop a deeper connection, Shoo starts to confront horrors from her own past, too.
Aleksandra Bystrzhitskaya and Olga Wehrly also star.
“Fréwaka” – world-premiering at Locarno and produced by the U.K.’s DoubleBand Films and Ireland’s Wildcard – is shot in Irish, with its title coming from the word “fréamhacha,” which means roots.
“Now is a great time for non-English language films,” noted Clarke.
“Horror audiences are especially willing to watch films with subtitles – language isn’t such a barrier. That being said, this was a film that was imagined in Irish from its inception. It never occurred to me to make it in English and I don’t think it would be quite the same if I had.”
She reached to local folklore, and old childhood nightmares, for inspiration.
“I didn’t invent anything, but I also didn’t necessarily cleave tightly to any rubber-stamped mythology. I come from a family of unofficial storytellers and I grew up hearing dark tales of the Na Sídhe, which are Irish fairies. As a child, my major takeaway was how much they hate us and want us to suffer. That terrified me – I wanted to capture this feeling in the film,” she told Variety.
“The stories I was told as a child were handed down by a word-of-mouth and, as is characteristic of oral tradition, they may have been embellished or tilted on the way, depending on the mood of the teller, the weather, or whether or not whiskey was involved,” jokes Clarke.
“For me, that’s what Irish storytelling is and always has been about: it’s a process of inheritance and reinvention.”
Clarke tends to “lean towards darkness” in her films. But ultimately, she just loves telling stories.
“Sometimes a story needs to be a horror film, but not always. Not all of what I’m currently writing and developing is straightforwardly genre,” she admitted. That being said, she is also aware that “horror has a great capacity to be universal.”
“It’s because horror’s primary language is emotional and emotion is universal. With this film, I was primarily trying to tell an Irish story that had, at its heart, some truthful texture about being human. That’s what I’m interested in,” she added.
“I’m very glad that it’s finding an audience outside of Ireland while still being such an unapologetically Irish film.”
Are you afraid? You should be.