The Living and the Dead Movie Download

8 / 10

A powerful study of the horror of schizophrenia.
I blind bought this mistakenly thinking it was some kind of zombie flick (put the words ‘living’ and ‘dead’ in a film’s title and I automatically think of zombies), but I couldn’t have been more wrong. The Living and the Dead actually deals with the all-too-real horrors of schizophrenia, and the terrible impact that such a condition can have on a family.

Roger Lloyd-Pack plays Lord Donald Brocklebank (not ‘bottlebank’, as I first thought), financially challenged owner of a run-down stately home, father of grown-up schizophrenic son James (Leo Bill), and husband to critically ill, bed-ridden Nancy (Kate Fahy). When Donald leaves the family home for a few days to sort out finances, James—keen to show his father how capable he can be—takes it upon himself to look after his mother, barricading the house against her nurse.

Of course, James proves to be a far from ideal carer, unable to adequately look after himself, let alone his mother; as time goes on, his schizophrenia goes from bad to worse, exacerbated by a careless approach to self-medication. Slowly, he becomes a danger to both himself and his mother.

Although The Living and the Dead is far from what one would traditionally term as ‘horror’, trust me when I say that what writer/director Simon Rumley depicts in this film is terrifying. Watching a person gradually descend into a personal hell and turn against his mother is harrowing enough, but there is also the suffering endured by Nancy due to her own illness: in one memorably nasty moment, the poor woman suffers the humiliation of soiling her bed, being carried to the bathroom covered in her own crap, and stripped naked by her son. Another very unsettling scene shows James injecting himself with anti-psychotic drugs, jamming the needles into his arm, leaving them jutting from his skin, and then having a turn and knocking them sideways. Yowch!

In a bold move by Rumley, the story then enters territory that REALLY messes with the mind: the visuals become totally chaotic and it becomes unclear as to what is reality and what is delusion. It also emerges that the story is being told using the ‘unreliable narrator’ style, coming from several viewpoints and casting doubt on the accuracy of all we have seen. This ‘alternate perception’ technique, which implies that Donald may be the one who is mentally ill, not his son, might lead to lots of confusion and uncertainty, but since we’re dealing with the subject of schizophrenia, it seems an apt treatment.

So… to summarise: no ambling undead, but plenty of ambiguity; no gut munching, but a visceral experience nonetheless; and no bullets to the brain, but enough emotionally distressing and downbeat content to scramble the viewer’s mind for a while.

7.5 out of 10, rounded up to 8 for IMDb.Read More