Sator: The unbearable tightness of waiting for a demon in the woods
By Jim Slotek
Rating: A-minus
A masterpiece of squeamishly uneasy, nightmarish mood-making, the demonic-possession film, Sator is partly in the vein of The Blair Witch Project – though much more sure-handed and stylistically sophisticated.
As such, horror fans of the slasher-film bent may complain “nothing is happening.” Coincidentally, both movies take place mainly in darkness and mainly in the woods.
It may be that Blair Witch is far down on the list of Sator’s – and writer-director Jordan Graham’s - influences. At times, through effect and atmosphere, Sator can evoke paganist side-glances at The Evil Dead (minus the slapstick and frenetic pacing), Twin Peaks and Lars von Trier’s Antichrist.
Add quirky, nature close-ups (a spider devouring a moth, a mosquito touching down for a meal on a character’s nose) and jumps to the black-and-white, square-ish aspect ratio that Robert Eggers used in The Lighthouse, and you have a grab-bag of atmospheric tricks that scream “impending horror,” even if the title demon’s actual appearances are few.
But at the heart of the tale is Graham’s own dementia-stricken grandmother, who ostensibly had a lifelong memory of spirits talking to her, and who experienced bouts of supposedly spirit-driven “automatic writing.”
That background story morphs seamlessly into this tale of a family grappling with its generations-long demonic baggage. Most of the film belongs to Adam (Gabriel Nicholson), who, as we meet him, is holed up in the proverbial cabin in the woods with his dog. He’s constantly shooting target practice with tin cans, checking his “deer-cam” for nocturnal activity and listening to old recordings of a woman’s messages, either about or directly from Sator, whose interest in Adam as a potential “disciple” is clearly telegraphed.
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To be clear, if I was convinced I was being hunted by a demon, I’d likely hightail it to the city. Spooky woods would be my last choice for making a stand.
For some time, Sator seems like it might be a one-man movie (with occasional flashbacks and hallucinations involving other people), but little by little, we come to know his brother Pete (Michael Daniel), friend Evie (Rachel Johnson), and the narratively important grandma, Nonnie (June Peterson).
In slowly released details and with almost no expositional dialogue (in fact no dialogue at all for minutes at a time), we come to discover the connecting tales of Sator. And we’re left to grapple with the dueling possibilities that either Sator is a real demon with an infernal fondness for this one family, or a psychiatric pathology passed on to succeeding generations (at least one of the characters spends time in a mental institution).
For the record, this mystery is the one ambiguous element Sator clears up by the movie’s end.
As to whether Sator is your horror cup of tea, it depends on whether you think a movie is more effective if it’s about horrific things happening, or about the fear of horrific things happening.
Sator. Written and directed by Jordan Graham. Starring Gabriel Nicholson, Michael Daniel and June Peterson. Available for streaming, Tuesday, February 9 on Apple TV, Prime Video, iTunes, Google Play and other platforms.