After a successful heist, casino robber Jens crosses the German/Luxembourg border with a bag full of cash and arrives at the rural town of Gutland. At first the locals are not welcoming, but when Lucy, the governor's daughter spends the night with Jens, everyone's demeanor changes and he's immediately offered a job as a farmer and a place to live in. If this sounds like things are going too good to be true, you're right. Gutland is a film full of ominous dread, there's a sense of suspicion at what may lay beneath the surface of the sleepy folkloric town.
GUTLAND directed by Govinda Van Maele is a slow burn thriller in the vein of THE WICKER MAN (the original, not the blasphemous remake) where a stranger arrives at a seemingly idyllic town only to discover that there's something ominous going on and despite his better judgment and warning signs he's still compelled to stay. There are two type of thrillers at play: the mundane heist and its aftermath which anchors the film in the real world and the more bizarre almost supernatural (but maybe not) mystery surrounding the village and its denizens. This is a balancing act that in other filmmaker's hands would be a jarring collision of tones and genres, but in Van Maele's hands becomes a seamless junction that introduces us into the village of Gutland the same way that Jens does, we come from a world of robberies and petty crime and we enter uncharted territory, and we stay until its inevitable final moments.
Van Maele's eye captures the beauty of the Luxembourg country side as a means to distract us from what is really going on, a way to get us to see things from the point of view of Jens. It combines film Noir elements with rural horror that verges into European folklore. An atmospheric mystery which further grabs hold of us and doesn't let go, much like the town does to Jens.
GUTLAND is equal parts beautiful and creepy, it gets under the skin and dies there long after the credits roll.
Review by Enrrico Wood Lagonigro - Senior Curator Oaxaca FilmFest.
GUTLAND directed by Govinda Van Maele is a slow burn thriller in the vein of THE WICKER MAN (the original, not the blasphemous remake) where a stranger arrives at a seemingly idyllic town only to discover that there's something ominous going on and despite his better judgment and warning signs he's still compelled to stay. There are two type of thrillers at play: the mundane heist and its aftermath which anchors the film in the real world and the more bizarre almost supernatural (but maybe not) mystery surrounding the village and its denizens. This is a balancing act that in other filmmaker's hands would be a jarring collision of tones and genres, but in Van Maele's hands becomes a seamless junction that introduces us into the village of Gutland the same way that Jens does, we come from a world of robberies and petty crime and we enter uncharted territory, and we stay until its inevitable final moments.
Van Maele's eye captures the beauty of the Luxembourg country side as a means to distract us from what is really going on, a way to get us to see things from the point of view of Jens. It combines film Noir elements with rural horror that verges into European folklore. An atmospheric mystery which further grabs hold of us and doesn't let go, much like the town does to Jens.
GUTLAND is equal parts beautiful and creepy, it gets under the skin and dies there long after the credits roll.
Review by Enrrico Wood Lagonigro - Senior Curator Oaxaca FilmFest.