A Dark Song is an interesting film to discuss. 

Upon release, A Dark Song received a ton of critical praise, but was considered divisive amongst horror fans- which is pretty much par for the course for most good nontraditional independent horrors. However, over time this Irish-British slow-burn horror has garnered a more favourable reputation with audiences, perhaps partially because surviving COVID lockdowns have helped people to empathize with some of the film’s themes. In fact, it is pretty amazing to think that a film essentially about people trapped in a house while pushing each other to their breaking point (remember that?) actually predates the pandemic by about four years. 

But A Dark Song is also about so, so much more than this.  

In fact, Liam Gavin’s debut feature opened new worlds to me. (Bad pun intended) Prior to seeing the film, I had never heard of Aleister Crowley or The Book of Abramelin. Or gnosticism. (I’ll reference all of these things later.) But reading about the occult ritual this film is based on has taken me down some interesting rabbit’s holes. 

And I have to wonder if Gavin hasn’t dabbled in a little dark magic himself. After all, how else can we explain the writer/director turning a $50,000 film- most of which was clearly spent filming the movie’s surreal third act- into such a truly unique, intellectual horror experience.

Our story starts with Sophia (Catherine Walker), a very dreary, serious woman who rents a secluded house in Wales. She pays in cash and asks that no record be kept of the transaction…so yeah, we can say her motives seem a little suspect. We soon learn that she is grieving the loss of her son and is planning on taking an action so extreme that she actually tells her concerned younger sister to just stay the Hell away from her.

Turns out, Sophia has necromantic aspirations and she has contacted several prominent occultists across the United Kingdom to make her plan a reality. But most turn down Sophia’s request…that is until she makes contact with a very blunt, unscrupulous, ornery man named Joseph Solomon (Steve Oram).

Sophia asks Joseph to help her perform a grueling ritual found in The Book of Abramelin that- assuming it works at all- will take several months to complete. If successful, Sophia will get to ask one wish from her guardian angel- a wish she says she will use to speak again with her dead son. Joseph also has plans to ask for a wish of his own.

But here’s the rub. For Sophia, the ritual will require limitations to her diet and her sleep. It will test her sanity. And when she gets to the end of a cycle- if it doesn’t work- she has to start all over again. 

And when I say months, I mean whole seasons could go by and she just has to take it on faith that she is getting closer to her goal and those so-called “signs” (aka- weird shit that is happening around the house) are not just simple coincidences or her having a mental breakdown…which they could very well be.

It doesn’t help that Joseph is a complete ass. And I mean he is a grade A douche-bag with real anger issues and some deep psychological scars from his previous experiences with the otherworldly. But if Sophia ends the ritual, or goes outside the circle of salt placed around  the house, Joseph claims that it will put them at the mercy of demons. 

Of course, just doing the ritual also risks inviting demons…so there’s that. Fuck Sophia. Just what have you set in motion?

One of the things that makes A Dark Song fantastic is that the ritual Sophia is performing is actually based on a real thing and this gives some extra credibility to what we are watching. In fact, many believe this to be one of the most accurate depictions of occult practices captured in a fictional horror film. In other words, there is actually some merit to Joseph’s mystic jargon. 

So if this ritual supposedly works, why doesn’t everyone try connecting their guardian angels? Well, actually, over the centuries quite a few people have tried- but the Abramelin ritual is both physically and mentally taxing and quite repetitive. 

I’ve read a few self-proclaimed Internet occultists that have seen the movie take issue with Joseph’s amoral behaviour and the film’s inclusion of demons. They point out that the actual ritual is more about using intensive, regimented meditation and confession to achieve spiritual enlightenment, though conversing with your guardian angel is still the end goal. But in the film, Joseph’s notebook suggests that he has dug a bit deeper into the ritual than what those who have paid $12.74 on Amazon may have. And some of his tweaks are outright torture. In the film, we see Sophia spend some days shivering intensely while Joseph pours cold water on her. Or else drinking blood to avoid the section about forgiveness. He is, after all, attempting to force a wish out of a holy deity- an end that goes beyond what the Abramelin ritual intended.

Of course, the various stages of this ritual go on for months. (I’ve read that the actual ritual can take anywhere between 6 to 16 months before your angel appears.) In Sophia’s case, it is also costly and requires a lot of planning. Sophia ends up paying Joseph 80,000 pounds for what he estimates to be about eight months’ work. She would also have had to figure out the food situation in advance because once Joseph starts the ritual, there is no leaving the house or bringing anyone outside in.

And again, there is also no guarantee that the ritual will even work. There are plenty of real world examples of the ritual failing, as with the famed English occultist Aleister Crowley. Even in terms of the film, Joseph claims he’s only been successful performing the ritual once. Twice he says he has failed, which is- of course- what someone might say to cover themselves, especially if they are engaging in an elaborate con.

And that is the power of A Dark Song. We too watch in constant wonder of whether Joseph’s bastardization of the Abramelin ritual is actually working and what the true motivations of Joseph and Sophia might actually be. And these concerns become real points of conflict between the characters. 

Of course, the main reasons the first two acts of A Dark Song work so well are because Walker and Oram act their asses off and Gavin’s direction is so suffocatingly serious and meticulously detail-oriented. The cinematography is gorgeous, which is pretty impressive considering most of the film is shot in confined spaces. And there is also a lot of truly memorable, intelligent dialogue surrounding theology, morality, science and the human condition. Joseph and Sophia may not like each other, but they do get into some pretty deep, engaging conversations.

But unlike a lot of low budget horrors, A Dark Song does offer fans a satisfying payoff. Gavin even manages to include a few spectacular special effects. And for a first feature, Gavin proves to have mastered how to properly craft a story that lends itself to multiple interpretations. Not that I’ve found all the theories people have come up with equally valid. Personally, if you want some extra help understanding the film better after viewing, I recommend turning to Cody Meirick’s online article, “A Dark Song Explained: A Gnostic Horror Masterpiece”. It helps to explain how Sophia’s Catholic upbringing may have hampered her understanding of the true purpose of Abramelin’s ritual. 

For a debut film made on a miniscule budget, Liam Gavin’s A Dark Song may be the very definition of an adult horror. It provides horror fans with a credible occult situation that explores themes of faith, trust and loss. It gets some truly great performances from the film’s leads. But most importantly, it is a film that actually has some originality and real intellectual teeth. In the days after watching the film, my mind keeps going back and forth on how all the pieces of this film fit. So very few films are ever successful at doing this.