His House Review (Film, 2020) #31DaysOfHorror
content warning: child loss, blood, gore, mental wellness/trauma, self-harm
Bol and Rial are asylum seekers from South Sudan. They are released on bail to live in a house chosen by the government. They are not allowed to work and must survive on a small weekly allowance to maintain good standing with their attempt to become citizens. The couple is still struggling with their memories while dealing with the new challenges of a quiet English town with some deep secrets.
His House is a slow-burn horror film about assimilation, grieving, and trauma. Bol and Rial are constantly bombarded with demands to forget their past and instantly act like English people. If they don’t, they will lose the broken house they were forced to live in and be sent back to South Sudan.
Meanwhile, the ghosts of the past literally follow them, growing in number and living in the cracks in the walls. If they leave the house, the world forces them back. If they stay inside, the ghosts try push them back to South Sudan.
Writer/director Remi Weekes crafts a beautiful horror film from trauma. This is the story of a couple that are constantly surrounded by pain and trying to survive together. In their country, a literal war puts their lives at risk every day. They chose to escape the country, facing a long and dangerous sea voyage with a high chance for death. Eventually, they seek asylum in England where they’re forced to live in a small room at a detention center before being given a broken home, a small budget, and the instruction to assimilate or face certain death with deportation.
The ghosts are terrifying, but at least the couple know what they’re dealing with. Rial explains that the apeth is communicating with them about the daughter they lost while fleeing South Sudan. He can bring her back if they follow his instructions.
Bol and Rial are torn between two cultures with the same goal of survival. Bol tries to assimilate as quickly as possible to ensure his future in the relative safety of England. He buys new clothes and makes friends in the community. The tension grows between the two as Bol tries to change their lives in the home, too. He asks to eat all of their meals at the kitchen table with a fork and a knife, even though Rial wants to eat their meal like always—sitting on the floor, sharing the food with their hands. He wants her to leave the house on her own and find her own friends and hobbies so she can assimilate quickly, too. More and more disagreements arise, as Bol and Rial have different visions of how they can find their happiness after a lifetime of trauma.
By the third act, all of these worlds and beliefs exist at the same time. Dreams can physically transport their reality, bringing Rial and Bol’s spirits back to South Sudan while physically being trapped in a dream state in their house in England. Meanwhile, the government employees monitoring their asylum application see nothing but an easy case for deportation; if they believe ghosts and witches are real, they’ll never really belong here. The couple are trapped between the past and the future, the spiritual and the physical, and something needs to give.
His House tells a ghost story that isn’t a haunted house story, even though it’s centered around a house. There is a strong distinction there that we don’t often get to see in cinematic horror. It’s a brilliant and beautiful exploration of some incredibly heavy subject matter. It’s dreary, but never hopeless.
His House is streaming on Netflix.
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