“My love is as a fever, longing still
For that which longer nurseth the disease…” – William Shakespeare, Sonnet 147
Leviticus is a love story in a horror framework. Its core concept bears similarities to 2014’s It Follows, with the protagonists being pursued by a murderous doppelganger-like entity. It Follows was a metaphor for the dangers of sexually transmitted diseases (and a parody of all those slasher films where having sex was an inevitable death sentence for all parties involved).
Leviticus on the other hand, with its two gay (and madly in love) main characters, is a rebuke of conservatives’ obsession with converting homosexuals “back to normal” and their refusal to acknowledge any parameters of love that fall outside the draconian texts of their Bibles.
Leviticus is Director/Writer Adrian Chiarella’s first full-length feature film and though it stumbles in places, it’s a better-than-average debut. I found the romantic scenes between Naim (played by Joe Bird) and Ryan (Stacy Clausen) to be the most effective and poignant parts of the film. Watching the two young guys fumble around in that awkward way all fledgling lovers do was heartwarming.
Whether you’re straight, gay or bi, who can forget the overwhelming physical experiences of being in your first serious relationship? Passion, expectation and nervousness go hand-in-hand and the two actors reflect that with warmth and authenticity.
As for the horror? Well, that’s not as gripping and I found that aspect of the movie to be repetitive and predictable.
It’s unleashed when a small group of ultra-religious townspeople (including Naim and Ryan’s parents), following the town’s half-mad pastor Rod (Ewen Leslie), learn that Ryan and the pastor’s son Hunter (Jeremy Blewitt) and perform an Exorcism/ritual on the two, which unleashes a demonic doppelganger-like spirit on the town. The spirit only appears to Ryan, Hunter and Naim when they’re alone, looking just like the person they love and lulling them into a false sense of security before unleashing murderous violence on them.
A romantic triangle is tough enough but throwing a demon in the thick of it really amps up the drama and at times there’s a perverse kind of fun in trying to guess whether the Ryan Naim is talking to at the moment is the real deal or the demon.
But the film would have been far more interesting and horrific if the whole demon concept was tossed out and the film focused on the borderline-nutso pastor, the religious zealots in the town and how Ryan and Naim are trying to secretly have a relationship in the midst of all that madness.
Naim’s mom Arlene (Mia Wasikowska and where has she been?) is especially fascinating. She’s calm and unemotional but a fervent believer in pastor Rod’s teachings. She’s the polar opposite of Margaret White, Carrie White’s mother in Carrie (the original GOOD one). Where Piper Laurie swung for the fences in every scene, wailing, moaning and speaking every line like she was on the precipice of tumbling into Hell, Wasikowska’s Arlene is equally religious but has an icy demeanor that’s never ruffled, even when her son Naim’s put through the Exorcism ritual in a mass of screaming and spraying bodily fluids. I wish we could have seen more of her character.
Though Leviticus drives home a great social message, it comes nowhere near the soaring heights of other recent horror films like Obsession and Backrooms, but if you loved It Follows you’ll love Leviticus.
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