In this review, Sarah Cullen casts her gaze on The Watched.

I’m slightly guilty of beginning this by talking about M. Night Shyamalan, considering The Watched is, of course, his daughter Ishana Night Shyamalan’s debut film. However, I would be lying if I said the Shyamalan connection wasn’t a draw. Much like M. Night’s back catalogue of zany plot descriptions, The Watched follows suit, delivering an odd premise with promise.

Mina (Dakota Fanning) is a loner who has never moved on from her mother’s death fifteen years ago. She lives in Galway, where she works at a pet shop. When she sets off to transport a golden conure parrot to a zoo near Belfast, she gets lost in an ancient woodland. There she encounters Madeline (Olwen Fouéré), who warns her about the dangers of the forest and offers her shelter in a mysterious building known as “the coop.” En route, Mina meets two other lost travellers, Daniel (Oliver Finnegan) and Ciara (Georgina Campbell). Mina also learns that they are being carefully watched by a mysterious group of beings. These watchers permit their prisoners to explore the woods during the day but confine them to the coop at night. Anyone caught outside after dark is violently punished.

There’s a tense, jumpy feel to the first half hour. This pacing is reminiscent of the ellipses used in The Sixth Sense. While it would be fair to say this introduces a definitive and uncomfortable tension to the story, it’s atmospheric at the expense of clarity, which doesn’t really tie into The Watched’s overall narrative or aesthetic. Despite such a strong cast, many aspects of the  characters and their dynamic remain a mystery, revealed through exposition rather than action.

What The Watched does well is deliver a sense of displacement, which perhaps relates to its origins in Irish author A.M. Shine’s book The Watchers. Not only is the geography of the ancient woodland destabilising—as there seems to be no way of escaping—the geography of The Watched’s Ireland is rather destabilising too: on her journey to Belfast (which, according to Google Maps, should take less than five hours), Mina must, for some unexplained reason, undertake a day-long journey driving through ancient woodland that is a far stretch away from any dual carriageway. There’s a satisfyingly eerie inference that the watchers’ influence encompasses the whole of Ireland.

As Mina and company eke out their existence—hunting in the forest and trying to discover the secrets behind the watchers—interesting themes and ideas are hinted at. The colour palette of drab greys, yellows, and greens is familiar to woodland horror. Thematically, there’s a compelling stab at commentary on AI: Madeline explains that the watchers spend their time observing human actions in order to copy them so they can replicate and even replace humans. My ears pricked up at this point, although ultimately, I’m not sure if that was the intention.

The Watched is certainly a mixed bag, and while it feels like some elements of the narrative might have benefited from more screen time, there are bold and interesting plot choices and distinctive creative decisions. Ishana Night Shyamalan chooses to focus on smaller, more restrained moments, establishing a distinct voice. Watch the trailer, and if you think you know what you’re going to get, you probably will get that. Whether it’s worth a watch is up to you.

The Watched is available to stream online now. 

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