[TADFF 2019 Review] 8 Sits at the Crossroads of Interesting and Boring

At one point in this South African folkloric movie, our semi-antagonist draws an 8 in the dusty ground and explains that the place they are at is a crossroads. A place where people could communicate with their ancestors. Where life and death meet, at the center of the figure 8. It’s an apt metaphor for 8, a movie that sits somewhere between being truly excellent and mediocre. 

It’s 1977, somewhere in South Africa. An old man lies wheezing in his deathbed as the door creaks open and a man we’ll soon learn is named Lazarus (Tshamano Sebe) enters, plopping a large leather sack on the floor. Rhythmic chanting bursts from Lazarus’s lips as the bag starts to wriggle open. “I am the wanderer. You are mine forever,” a voice over says as we see the old man, now dead.

This event causes the man’s son William (Garth Breytenbach) to travel back to his family farm, with his wife Sarah (Inge Beckmann) and his adopted niece Mary (Keita Luna). Mary’s mom (William’s sister) and father died at some point before the movie begins...but it’s ambiguous as to the hows or whys. She’s the kind of bright-eyed, precocious child who keeps a box of silkworms, who she’s named and says will never leave her after they transform, and knows a lot about South African folktales. 

They arrive at the farm in Hemel op Aarde, the house is dark and silent. William hasn’t been home for years, but it’s obvious he’s under some unknown financial strain and he wants to get the farm up and working. While William and Sarah work on getting the power back and cleaning up the dust, Mary goes exploring and runs into Lazarus. Lazarus used to be the family’s farmhand and awkwardly gets invited to stay on the farm to help them get it back in shape. 

But Sarah doesn’t trust him. And Obara (Chris April) a nearby village’s tribal leader ominously tells his flock, “He’s back. He’s dangerous.” As we start to learn of Lazarus’s past, we discover that his wife died in childbirth and his daughter was killed in a fire. Lazarus, full of grief, performs a ritual to bring his daughter back to life and ends up cursed to collect souls for the demon he keeps hidden in his sack. He’s a somewhat unwitting participant in this curse; a man who just wanted his family back. But that doesn’t stop him from unleashing the creature. And he seems to have his eyes set on Mary…

Harold Holscher’s debut feature is a mixed bag...pardon the pun. There’s a strong undercurrent of metaphors that add some thematic weight to the narrative. Each character carries grief with them. For Sarah, it’s the fact that she can’t ever get pregnant. She rather dramatically says, “I’m like a dead tree without any purpose.” And when William points out that she kind of has a child in Mary, she replies, “she’s not mine. She’ll never be mine.” Oof.

William’s grief comes in the form of the financial issues surrounding him and trying to keep his little, dwindling family together. Mary misses her mother, content to sleep in her mother’s old bed to feel close to her. Lazarus, of course, literally carries around his grief with him on his back, in the heavy leather sack. As we know, grief loves to be fed. “I’m still hungry…” the thing in his bag whispers after being fed. 

Meanwhile, the scenery captured by cinematographer David Pienaar is lush and beautiful. The use of color is stunning, particularly in the trippy finale. So far, so good. It’s just that I didn’t care a lick for the characters at the center of the story. William and Sarah are cold to each other and devolve into fighting, while Mary just sort of exists in the story. They’re a pretty vanilla family in this story and the pacing just comes to a screeching stop throughout the second act. 

I loved seeing South African folklore brought to life and Tshamano Sebe imbues Lazarus with pathos as he walks that very thin line between being a very nice and caring man who also feeds people to a demon he thinks is his daughter. As a metaphor for how we all carry grief on our shoulders to the point it becomes an unwieldy weight, 8 works. I just wish it were more interesting to watch.