Lilith’s Awakening, 2016.
Directed by Monica Demes.
Starring Steven Kennevan, Sam Garles, Sophia Woodward, Barbara Eugenia, Matthew Lloyd Wilcox.
SYNOPSIS:
A sexually repressed service station employee is bored of her marriage and seeks to embrace her dark side.
Lucy (Sophia Woodward) finds marital life with husband Jonathon (Sam Garles) to be unfulfilling and monotonous. Jonathon’s demanding domestic chores, like purchasing the beers for the arrival of his boss that evening, causes her to retreat, and to seek excitement elsewhere. Cue underachiever co-worker Arthur (Matthew Lloyd Wilcox) whose aggressive alpha-masculine approaches appear to partially fulfil this void in Lucy.
Shot in a black & white colour scheme, with snippets of other colours of the spectrum, the film elicits a dreamlike quality that gives it the licence to push, and to blur the boundaries between fantasy and reality.
Filmmaker Monica Demes pits these opposing male types to compete for Lucy’s affection. Jonathon explains the importance of Lucy’s domestic duties: “My boss and his wife are coming to dinner.” This dialogue is a composite of gendered stereotypes of how “men” speak; in other words, this is how Lucy feels about Jonathon’s dialogue, and not necessarily how he actually speaks. Furthermore, his demand does become a leitmotif to emphaise Lucy’s isolative state.
The film is much about Lucy’s understanding of her desire, and a necessity to break from the patriarchal rule that dominates her milieu. In one notable scene, somebody asks her where her husband is; in a 2016 film, this is an odd request, but it is there, much like Jonathon’s dialogue, for emphasis on Lucy’s psychosis. Does she feel like a shadow of her former-self?
Looking into the darkness Lucy senses an evil presence is lurking. Lucy’s senses aren’t wrong as a vampiric being named Lilith (Barbara Eugenia) comes to personify the power that Lucy is lacking; Lilith is essentially Lucy’s doppelganger. I shan’t go into too much detail for fear of spoilers, but needless to say it’s a subversion of gender roles on the Dracula myth.
Lilith’s Awakening is laden with Lynchian fingerprints as Monica Demes foregrounds her influences. It’s an atmospheric psychological thriller that only loses its way in the final act.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Matthew Lee
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Originally published June 14, 2016. Updated April 14, 2018.
