Every story has two sides. Take the legacy of Abraham Van Helsing, for example. Bram Stoker's Dracula portrays him as a vampire-hunting savior who defeats the bloodsucking Count, but what if that's propaganda? Natasha Kermani's adaptation of Joe Hill's short story "Abraham's Boys" portrays a different side of Van Helsing. The line between hero and monster is a fine one, and Kermani explores it in a 20th-century period piece that questions an iconic horror figure.
Titus Welliver plays Dr. Abraham Van Helsing, who has relocated his family to an isolated piece of land in California's Central Valley. We examine Abraham from the perspective of his eldest son, Max (Brady Hepner): an overprotective husband to his ailing wife, Mina (Jocelin Donahue), and a stern father to his younger son, Rudy (Judah Mackey). Mina's affliction is linked to vampirism, and Abraham lives in constant fear of creatures raiding his home, drawn by Mina's scent. It's time for Max and Rudy to learn Abraham's craft, but after delving into his world of vampire slayers, they begin to fear that their beloved father is far more sinister than his teachings let on.
Director: Natasha Kermani
Writers: Natasha Kermani, Joe Hill
Stars: Titus Welliver, Brady Hepner, Judah Mackey
Kermani's story, "Little Fangs on the Prairie," draws on a more gritty 1910s horror genre, where Abraham hides from the growing California railroad tracks. Julia Swain's American cinematography encompasses windswept fields of grass and sweeping Western mountain ranges, highlighting the Van Helsings' isolation. Abraham isolates his family from society, creating a more understated narrative about domestic matters and minimal interference. A quote about vampirism opens the film, but those familiar with Hill's short fiction will know it's a bit misleading. "Abraham's Boys" is undoubtedly a Van Helsing film, but not a vampire film. The film's pacing poses a problem, given its emphasis on subtle horrors.
Welliver's performance creates discomfort as he reveals himself to be an abusive, impulsive lunatic dedicated to a questionable cause, but there's a sense of inertia. Abraham frequently warns his sons of potential threats knocking at their door, but the wait becomes tedious. The conversations tell us what to fear rather than what they show us, which is typical of Hill's less well-rendered story. Scenes drag on as Max chops wood, Abraham scolds his relatives, and Mina lies sick in bed, but fear never fills the silence. Kermani loses himself in the film's narrative preliminaries, launching intense and passionate provocations without sufficient continuity.
Welliver's imposition as this stoic representation of evil disguised as good is, at times, chilling. He never smiles, hiding white teeth that gleam against his tanned skin, and he speaks with an assertive authority that puts everyone in their place. The way he berates Max and Rudy is worse than driving a stake through undead demons, but it's also all the film has in terms of suspense. We fear for Max as Abraham's outbursts worsen, leaving him bruised and threatening "cleansing." If you remove vampirism from Abraham's profession, he's simply a serial killer, and that's a fascinating analysis. Unfortunately, the lack of intensity feels more flattened by Abraham's more surgical and sterile attributes.
I kept thinking of points of comparison like "I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House" or "1922," where the horrors struggle to surface. Kermani uses vampiric imagery in a dream sequence or flies a bat indoors as an ominous portent, but "Abraham's Boys" relies too heavily on dialogue. The weight of Abraham's words should hurt like hell, but they resonate in an otherwise empty atmosphere. There's overdramatization in Max and Rudy's conversations, while Donahue's crazed state—where she panics from feeling unsafe—isn't enough to pull us out of an almost lullaby-like rut. It's a sobering and sad experience to a fault, one that becomes apathetic rather than disturbing.
Abraham's Boys is a grim period piece that subverts vampire expectations but falters when it addresses themes of prisons and inherited sins. Kermani's talent as a filmmaker is evident in the pictorial aspects and the performance he draws from Welliver, but his film never rises above a murmur. It's a meandering experience that heads toward an inevitable outcome, coming and going with the wind. Dangerous and vile in unexpected ways, but ultimately disappointing.
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