Toss lives on a sheep farm with her father in New Zealand. When Toss's father dies in an accident, Ethan, an itinerant hunter, wanders onto the family farm and is given a job by her grandfather. Toss's fairly innocent relationship with Ethan is severed when he forms a relationship with her mother.
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Vincent Ward's Vigil is a really interesting, almost other-wordly, effort. A coming-of-age film, about stresses and difficulties of change (bodily, emotionally, intellectually) becalmed by glorious photography, of greens and of every shade of mud. At times I thought of it as a plot-less folk horror; it isn't horror per se, but it is intrinsically unsettling. It opens with animals and death, a sex scenes climaxes, strange occurrences occur, and the whole 90 minutes lingers in your mind uncomfortably. It has no real plot, but plenty happens, as Ward envisions a world on screen, what happens in that world does not mean as much as the world itself.
Vincent Ward is a proper cinematic visionary (as Roger Ebert had it) and…
Cinematic Time Capsule
1984 Marathon - Film #99
”I’ve got something to show you”
Remember that time in your life when magic had the possibility of being real? When the world was still mysterious, and spirits both good and bad were hiding in every shadow?
I don’t think anyone has captured these feeling better than Vincent Ward in Vigil. It’s simultaneously poetic, disconcerting and beautiful.
The essence of the story is relatively simple: a young girl loses her father in a tragic accident and a then new farm hand disrupts the family even further… but what makes it all come alive is how we experience these events through the active imagination and unreliable eyes of this girl.
I’m really surprised more people haven’t seen this, because if someone like A24 released it in theaters today, I’d be willing to bet it’d be all the rage.
”We can’t stop the hills caving in on us.”
Atmospheric, haunting, hypnotic and poetic - Vincent Ward's visually beautiful debut is essential Kiwi arthouse brilliance.
Vigil is a film about the elemental forces of nature: weather, geology, sex and death. The score does its best to assert an apocalyptic mood with its drones and moans, and scurries and shrieks. It’s a bit too aggressive for my taste, and rather than complement the film’s striking imagery it tends to undermine it. What it does do though is give the film a vaguely supernatural or end-of-time atmosphere, which is a curious contrast to what in all other respects appears to be a simple and slight tale set on a contemporary New Zealand farm.
Narratively, it’s built around a young girl’s coming of age and her mounting fears following the death of her father. A poacher retrieves her…
Poems written on farms.
A coming-of-age gem that feels part post-apocalyptic, part folk horror, and yet is neither of those things—an undeniably atmospheric adventure. It’s quiet, it’s beautiful to look at, and there’s a real bleak moodiness present. Childhood grief portrayed as how the rain dampens the spirits but also masks the tears; that cold, wet skin ultimately reminds you that you’re alive. Interesting how this is more dreamlike than Vincent Ward’s later literal dream-based film—maybe that’s just because of those New Zealand landscapes.
Atmospheric drama from Vincent Ward. Adolescent 'Toss' lives on a remote farm in New Zealand with her family. Toss is forced to deal with the aftermath of her beloved father's death, and the introduction of farm hand 'Ethan'. A strange, absorbing and eerie piece - there’s certainly a folk horror vibe to this. A study of maturity / coming-of-age and grief - we see how the loss of the patriarch affects the family dynamics and the farm business. Beautifully presented, boasting some stunning and colourful New Zealand landscape shots - all tinged with a tangible, otherworldly quality and punctuated by a fairly off-beat score. Very light on plot. Certainly more of a moody, character-driven ride - the various interactions become the general focus of the film. The performances are good across the board - with Kay and Kerr perhaps the stand outs. An enjoyable, unique and lo-fi gem.
Arrow Video release viewed.
When a stranger arrives with Toss' deceased father over his shoulders and works his way into the family's affairs Toss starts to suspect this stranger may be the devil himself.
Vigil is a mist and mud-filled mood piece filmed in New Zealand showing off some of our best rusty iron roofs and worn farming machinery. The saturated colours flaunt the beautiful yet rugged landscape that almost seems to mirror the internal struggles of the protagonist, from lush green rolling hills to twisted trees that cant make up their mind which way they want to grow. It is a coming of age story dealing with grief and growth, loss of faith and the realisation that life isn't always going to go…
I remember when I was a child, I would collect weird things: an unusually-shaped rock, colorful leaves, or little trinkets and charms. These things would be imbued with a special significance to me and were used as good luck charms and to ward away perceived dangers. Of course, as a adult I see this for what is was--a child's overactive imagination, but the idea that the world of the young is filled with symbolism and mysticism is a beautiful idea well worth exploring.
In Vincent Ward's film Vigil (1983) a young girl named Toss (Fiona Kay) inhabits such a dream world, specifically the period of time between childhood and adulthood. She lives on an isolated farm in the New Zealand…
A young girl lives on an isolated New Zealand farm with her parents and grandfather. After she loses a family member, a newcomer threatens to tear her world apart.
A moving film about loss and isolation and growing up.
This fog-filled world succeeds where similar ambitious films fail. The acting feels natural, the setting feels real, and I felt engaged throughout. It's the right kind of slow, the right kind of beautiful, and the right kind of tragic.
It's not a universal recommendation, but it's darn close. My only previous exposure to Vincent Ward was What Dreams May Come, but I'm definitely going to check out The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey. If you love slow films, hold a Vigil.
Grandad, I think, I'm dying grandad
- Aren't we all ?
الفيلم دا مكنش عندي مانع اديله اربعه لانه فعلا عجبني جدا
بس فيه مشهدين ضايقوني جامد هما اللي وقعوا الفيلم بالنسبة لي و مكنش ليهم أي لازمة حقيقي
و لكن غير كده المناظر ف الفيلم كانت جميلة و تمثيل البنت الصغيرة هادي و لطيف
و أمها ولية مش كويسة عامة
Muddy, foggy, mucky, off-grid, full of atmosphere and impeccably shot. Kinda reminded me of Monos where the setting is so isolated that it almost feels post-apocalyptic at times. The story didn’t really connect with me that much, but it was kinda the perfect film for a chilly, rainy night in. Every film should be set in New Zealand tbh. Cool stuff.
Ravenous, carnivorous cinema; of dark & mouldering spaces where the fruiting bodies sprout but never die, just crumple & grow, over & over in a tangle of a place where time always sits & waits for your return. A filmic capsule of a memory that might have been your whole life, or just a moment, but the mud & brambles stick forever. No need for water to wash it clean; these textures are of the soul, if you grew up green, climbing, hiding, digging. If you grew up strange, dangerous, outside, then perhaps you dreamt you'd already seen this film. I think it's dreaming us.
