Dachra: Frightfest 2019 film review

There is at least one in every film festival it seems. A film you want to love but just can’t. For me that film in this year’s Frightfest is Dachra.

Dachra is about three film students on a deadline, who decide to investigate a salacious story one of them has heard about a mad woman (or possibly witch) for their project. They find this woman in an asylum, though she says very little, and so they hunt down her home village for the rest of their film, where they find themselves in the midst of a good old “hillbilly horror” trope.  No, this isn’t just an American thing. The UK had one with White Settlers, and there was a similar (Canadian) film set in Poland called The Shrine; now we have such a film made and set in Tunisia.

Dachra isn’t Tunisia’s first horror film (apparently, there were two earlier), though it is the first feature written and directed by Abdelhamid Bouchnak. Unfortunately, he seems to have picked familiar elements that horror fans might be familiar with from many films from other countries. The three filmmakers could easily have been the ones from The Blair Witch Project (but with extra squabbling), and the settlement could have been inspired by any number of similar places in films from Deliverance to The Ritual.

The Dachra settlement has a real and well drawn sense of place, mind you, but a regrettable lack of originality. And don’t get me started on the child in the red coat! I could keep on citing possible inspirations (whether it is the old man who tries to help or – sorry – the ending), but I shan’t. Just take it from me this isn’t a film to watch if you are hoping to be wowed with a brand new story.

What it does have, though, is a very believable cast. The three students, played by Yassmine Dimassi, Aziz Jbali and Bilel Slatnia (why is it always two guys and a girl?) are generally fed up with each other, suspicious, determined to finish and at times apathetic too. Like a group of students from any locality.

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Watching them is like watching people who have worked together so many times they can no longer be arsed making an effort to get along. Sure, the bickering is annoying at times, but it makes the trio more authentic. The sense of obligation to see a project to completion can get between people, with or without the added stress of bizarre villagers and not knowing how to get home.

The acting is naturalistic all round. Amongst the Dachra natives, I especially liked the village leader, who zigzagged between hospitable and superior. Strangely, he reminded me of the person who guided my husband and I to a remote village on our honeymoon in Morocco. Fortunately, we had a much more pleasant visit than Yassmine, Walid and Bilel. He and the other residents helped in giving their home a tangible sense of place, though their little society had a baffling regard for women. Some were revered as wise witches, and some treated as little more than servants (or worse).

Clichéd though they were, the sets – asylum, forest and village – were very well observed and presented. I felt the cold dust in the house where the three stayed, and would have been scared of getting lost in the woods just as they were. Yet, if I stumbled across Dachra I have no doubt I would recognise it. The production in general, though particularly the cinematography, is a success here; not least when the story gets to the nasty moments. Dachra manages to be suggestively gory without being violent for long.

At the risk of dropping a smallish spoiler, I would like to mention the other issue I had with Dachra. Just before the closing credits, some text and pictures referred to children who are subject to acts of witchcraft. The film may have come about due to news reports along those lines, but if it is intended to raise awareness of social issues, then – as with last year’s The Devil’s Doorway – I consider a horror film of this nature to be rather a heavy-handed way of doing so.

Perhaps there are local legends, superstitions or culture in Tunisia which deserve to be brought to worldwide cinema audiences. I would hope that can be done without resorting to scenes and clichés already established in English-speaking horror films.