Susan Granger’s review of “The Calling” (Vertical Entertainment)
Despite its flimsy plot and low-budget, this wannabe mystery attracted a hefty roster of experienced actors, headed by Susan Sarandon, Ellen Burstyn and Donald Sutherland.
Set in Fort Dundas, a small, rural town in Ontario, Canada, the story revolves around a divorced, pain-wracked police officer, Detective Inspector Hazel Micallef (Sarandon), who suffers from a herniated disc, among other maladies. One morning, as Hazel is making her usual rounds, swilling her liquor-laced coffee, she discovers the gruesome corpse of an ailing, elderly woman whose throat has been cut and whose head is nearly severed. Soon after, a stranger named Simon (Christopher Heyerdahl) appears in town. He’s an herbalist healer/religious fanatic and, obviously, a serial killer-on-the-prowl for his next victim, someone who will willingly drink his toxic tea. Joining Hazel in her grisly investigation – which reaches across Canada – are a fellow detective Ray (Gil Bellows) and Ben (Topher Grace), a recent rookie transfer from Toronto.
Adapted by Scott Abramovich (“Prayer Hour”) from a novel by Inger Ash Wolfe (a.k.a. Canadian author Michael Redhill), it’s filled with clichés and lethargically directed by Jason Stone (“This Is the End”), who fails to achieve any dramatic momentum despite the dark, pseudo-religious theme, since it’s obvious from the moment he appears that Simon is the murderer.
What redeem this weird thriller are the strong performances. Susan Sarandon delves far deeper than the writing allows into Hazel’s angst. Christopher Heyerdahl (TV’s “Hell on Wheels”) displays a creepiness that knows no bounds. Ellen Burstyn toys with humor as Hazel’s concerned mother, a retired judge. And Donald Sutherland scores as the elderly cleric who unravels the murky, mysterious mysticism, which is based on ancient and archaic Christian scriptures.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “The Calling” is a supernatural 3, a somber meditation on ritualistic murder.
