Movie review «Curse of the Sin Eater»

On November 14, Ukrainian cinemas screened another horror film that is now being released with enviable regularity, namely — «Curse of the Sin Eater». Its plot is based on an ancient, strange, and disgusting ritual that was practiced in the UK, but most of all, they say, in Wales. In the review below, we will tell you what kind of terrible misfortune befell the hero of this movie and how scary it looks on the movie screen.

«Curse of the Sin Eater»

Genre horror, thriller
Director Justin Denton
Starring Carter Schempp, Elizabeth Laidlaw, Marcelo, Augustus Wright, Shayna Schrute, Larry Yando, Marika Engelhardt, J. Zane Stevens, Ryan Oliver
Premiere movie theaters
Year of issue 2024
Website IMDb

Young construction worker Rick Malone is struggling to make ends meet, so he greedily jumps at any opportunity to make some extra cash. He is currently working on a construction project at the estate of an old rich man, George Drayton. One day, Rick is lucky enough to find himself inside the luxurious building, but unlucky enough not to be caught red-handed trying to steal 20 bucks for a bus ride home. However, much to the burglar’s surprise, Drayton not only doesn’t fire him from his job, but instead makes him a stupid but tempting offer.

The story is that after the old man’s death, which is obviously not far off, Rick undertakes to eat lunch directly from his dead body, and in return, he will receive all the deceased’s wealth — estate, money, cool cars in the garage, etc. At first, the bewildered boy refuses such a dubious pleasure, but his difficult financial situation makes him change his mind.

Perhaps finding the courage to eat from your dead grandfather’s body to afford to eat sushi made from naked beauties is not the worst idea in the world. Only the unfortunate man didn’t realize that he was entering into a truly Faustian bargain, and the unlimited black card would be a weak consolation against the nightmare that awaited him.«Curse of the Sin Eater» was the debut feature film as a director for visual effects specialist Justin Dayton. He has worked on many Hollywood blockbusters, such as, «Terminator: Salvation», «Twilight», «Battleship» or «47 Ronin», but his directorial experience is limited to a couple of short films.

Local screenwriters Adam Davis and Will Corona Pilgrim are not exactly experienced either: the former has worked exclusively in the short film format, and the latter’s most notable work is the interactive exhibition «Avengers S.T.A.T.I.O.N.» (2014), based on the «Marvel» blockbuster of the same name. The authors’ inexperience in working in feature films is reinforced by the obvious low budget, so the narrative is content with only a few locations and limited ambitions to scare the viewer. The story is based on the ancient ritual of so-called sin-eating, which is mostly associated with Great Britain. In particular, it took place in Scotland, Ireland, as well as in Wales and the English counties bordering it. The term itself seems to have originated from Welsh culture. The essence of this strange custom was that before burial, a person had to eat ritual food from the deceased’s chest for a fee, thereby taking away his sins.

The last documented case of so-called sin-eating is found in the 1911 article of the «Encyclopedia Britannica». The ritual took place in 1893 in the English town of Market Drayton; now just notice the name of the old rich man in the story.

If we talk about the creative efforts of the authors of the «Curse of the Sin Eater», they are, in general, quite meager. It’s another unremarkable story from the «I See Dead People» category, only cinema has long since digested this not very inventive genre trope and even managed to forget about it. M. Night Shyamalan in the late 90s succeeded to bring such a narrative to a fundamentally qualitative level, and there are plenty of horror stories about the disfigured ghosts of the dead. And this is not to mention the fact that the Wayans brothers in their «Scary movie» ridiculed this technique almost a quarter of a century ago.

And it is quite difficult to get into the horror, in which the most terrifying thing is the scene of the protagonist eating ritual food. At its climax, you just want a smiling old man to come around the corner and hand the victim a packet of Mezym, shouting «oh, well done!».

The weak, boring narrative, the lack of suspense and truly frightening moments, and some completely uninspired acting by local little-known actors — all this puts a big, fat cross on the fact that this film is a successful genre example. To a greater extent, it looks like a banal attempt to feed the viewer a completely stillborn movie.