The term, ‘southern gothic’ usually conjures up Faulknerian landscapes where weeping willows and draped Spanish moss preside over dark decaying mansions, whose inhabitants are the keepers of deep family secrets, and scenarios where occurrences bizarre, macabre, or fantastical are the norm. Or perhaps, it might call to mind a Tennessee Williams backdrop where the atmosphere is heavy with the scent of rotting magnolia, and characters are drinking themselves senseless in lives where adultery, incest, or murder feature. ‘Undertow’, a new film by David Gordon Green, could be described as southern gothic, since it contains some of those elements, but it is not a period piece. Although it appears to be set in the present, it feels timeless – barefoot boys and ramshackle houses – it could be the 1940s or the 1840s, or in parts of the neglected south, 2004.

John Munn (Dermot Mulroney) and his two young sons, Chris (Jamie Bell, ‘Billy Elliot’) and Tim (Devon Alan) are living in a rundown house in the woods of rural Georgia. At first, it seems as though he and the boys live the kind of insular life that one would associate with the most remote and inbred backwoods existence. Pig farming and taxidermy are the mainstays, but it is revealed later that he has relocated there from some undisclosed urban location following the death of his wife and the boys’ mother. The older teenage boy, Chris, is having the usual problems – misunderstood and in trouble with the local cops while the younger brother, Tim, lives in a fantasy world of his own, in which he organizes his books ‘by the way they smell’ and appears to have a strange eating disorder in which he’s compelled to eat things like paint and mud. Amidst a background of tall beautiful Georgia pines and rusting castoff objects that litter the place, the three seem to live in an atmosphere of deep sadness and gloom.

The arrival of the John’s brother, Deel is an ominous event. He turns up at the house, just out of prison but it is not said from where or for what. Although John tries to work him into the family’s routine, it’s plain that there’s something else on his mind. The tension builds as Uncle Deel gets more alarming by the minute, displaying a barely contained hostility. There’s resentment in Deel’s tone as he tells Chris that he was their mother’s boyfriend first. There is also talk of a bag of Mexican gold coins hidden somewhere in or around the house, of which, Deel claims to be owed half. The gold coins do exist but there is a curse attached to them, explains John to his sons. He further relates how his father came by them – they were said to have belonged to Charon, the mythical ferryman on the River Styx and are reputed to bring bad luck and misfortune to those who possess them, because they truly belong to those who seek passage to peaceful deaths. The coins are discovered by Deel; a moment of violence occurs and the boys realize that they have to flee.

The film unfolds at this point into a suspenseful but also dreamy and surreal sequence as the boys run further away from life as they knew it. Along the way, they encounter various characters, real enough but also strange in the way people in dreams sometimes are. Their flight takes them through deep woods and swamps, through junkyards and docks and they keep going simply because they must. The sense of dreaminess is enhanced by lingering camera shots, and the suspense, by a minimalist soundtrack from composer Philip Glass.

The American south, because of its natural landscape and terrain, has always been and continues to be, a perfect setting for stories of myth, violence, retribution, and redemption. It is a neo-primitive place; there are things hidden in its hills, woods and rivers – ghosts, spirits and secrets. It’s a beautifully sad atmosphere of death and decay but strong in its sense of survival and regeneration. David Gordon has created a beautiful film in which these elements appear alongside a sense of myth, suggested in the references to the River Styx as a version of the afterlife. In ‘Undertow,’ the river also serves as a place of re-birth.

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Marc Goldin currently lives in Chicago, with three cats, each one more long-haired than the last. Interests have ranged from medieval monasticism to discontinued stations on the London Underground – literary likes too diverse (some would say schizo) to list here although the last several years have been witness to an intimacy with Scottish and Irish literature. American Southern and Beat era lit also account for some of the ‘missing years’. Music tastes run the gamut from Cuban Danzon to Ska (all three waves but having a specific attachment to the second, two-tone period) to the Tuvan throat singers. Has written book reviews for a now defunct Irish literature site and has several short stories in various stages of development. Mad for black and white photography and aspires to someday have a complete collection of photos documenting every close in the Grassmarket area of Edinburgh. Works in the IT dept. of a French company in the current political climate. In football, supports Chelsea, Hibs, and for the sake of employment security, Marseille.

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© 2004 Laura Hird All rights reserved.