The Watchers

A real disappointment. <em>'The Watchers'</em> holds some promise with its premise, though unfortunately it never really clicks into gear - in my opinion, at least. In fact, the longer it went on the more bored I felt whilst watching. I was waiting for the arrival of the end credits, which I thought were coming after 'the event' seemingly ends... yet the film still goes on for a little while yet. No-one on the cast did anything that could save this, either. Olwen Fouéré is decent, her character starts off fairly interestingly but by the conclusion I didn't really care for her either. The only positive I have for this 2024 flick is the score, which actually is quite good. Aside from that, this Ishana Night Shyamalan directorial debut underwhelmed me a lot, sadly.

Now my Irish geography isn't brilliant, but even I know that to drive from Galway to Belfast takes about four hours and does not involve any forest tracks. Nevertheless, pet shop worker "Mina" (Dakota Fanning), who is still coming to terms with a not very recent tragedy, sets off with her rare yellow bird only for her car to break down in the middle of an ancient forest. With no phone reception, she decides to leave her car and taking the caged bird with her, proceeds to wander through the trees shouting help! Pointless? Well no, as it happens, because she luckily encounters "Madeline" (Olwen Fouéré) who lives in a large concrete bunker with "Daniel" (Oliver Finnegan) and "Ciara" (Georgina Campbell). It appears that they have all been stranded in the woods and take shelter after sunset from the "watchers". These are mysterious creatures who like to come and watch their guests, via a great big one-way mirror, for a while each night. "Mina" is determined to escape and with the help of "Daniel" reckons she has a plan, but this just irritates their captors to the point that their "coup" is no longer safe. Hey, but wait - there's a submarine hatch in the floor, and when they go down they discover a lot more about who their enemy are, what they want and just who built this equivalent of a nuclear fall out shelter under the trees. Can they use this information to escape the trap and make it to freedom? At times it is quite menacing with their dark and wooded surroundings adding a degree of malevolence to an antagonist that we never really see and whose Gaelic mythological provenance is disappointingly undercooked. It has a go at ending a few times, but then comes back to add a little more to signal what I thought was that there'll be a sequel along shortly, rather than finish the adventure completely. It's not terrible, and Fanning delivers adequately - as does the gorgeous yellow bird, but you'll never remember it.