What
was an ancient civilization doing in the northern most regions of the Yukon’s
Taiga Cordillera? Not much, at least not anymore. However, their stag-headed
demigod might be up to some bad supernatural business in writer-director Nick
Szostakiwskyj’s Black Mountain Side (trailer here), which screens
during the 2015 SF Indie Fest.
Although
there are indigenous peoples in the Taiga Ecozone, by the time you reach the
research station commanded by Myles Jensen, civilization thins out to pretty much
nothing. That is why the discovery of a Mesoamerican monument (or rather the
visible tip of it) is such a significant surprise. The more academically
respectable Peter Olsen is flown out to inspect it, unfortunately for him. He
agrees, it is the darnedest thing, but it is not Mesoamerican.
Soon
thereafter, the camp cat is found murdered at the excavation site, like a
sacrifice at an altar. The next day, the outpost’s indigenous workers have all
taken to the wind. With the weather getting even worse, the men are cut off from
the world, struggling with each other’s increasingly violent, delusional behavior,
diagnosed by the camp doctor as the result of exposure to an ancient but still
potent virus.
Frankly,
Szostakiwskyj’s surprisingly subtle script allows for the possible the bedlam
might just as easily be the product of an all-too human psychosis brought on by
stress and isolation as it is the result of a killer virus or the work of a
malevolent entity. We can probably safely assume all three are a factor in the
ensuing chaos.
Despite
the severed body parts, Mountain is
remarkably restrained for a horror film. Much like the original Howard Hawks
produced The Thing, it features some
unusually smart dialogue, particularly the speculation regarding the vanished
civilization that left behind the ominous artifact (someone should have thrown
a bone up in the air in front of it to see if it would turn into a space
station). This film was not exactly a bumper crop of opportunities for
actresses, but Szostakiwskyj deals pretty forthrightly with both sides of
masculinity—the cerebral reserve and the arm-chopping violence.
Arguably,
Mountain is a little too quiet,
soaking up atmosphere when it should be getting somewhere quicker. The primary
characters are also a bit tricky to differentiate from one another. Mostly,
they are smart, intense, and liberally appointed with facial hair. Still,
Michael Dickson makes all of Olsen’s anthropological speculation sound cool.
