Weirdness in West Virginia On the Trail of UFOs: Dark Sky

The latest production from the Small Town Monsters team offers fascinating first-hand accounts of uncanny encounters in rural West Virginia, somewhat undermined by dodgy recreations

Dir Seth Breedlove, US 2021 On digital platforms

On the Trail of UFOs: Dark Sky, the latest documentary from Small Town Monsters, follows on the heels of a web series On the Trail of UFOs (2020). Documentary filmmaker Seth Breedlove (his debut in front of the camera), together with Shannon LeGro, host of the web series and emcee of the podcast Into the Fray, visit the rural areas of WestVirginia – the film’s subtitle refers to the region’s lack of light pollution, which may account for its high number of UFO sightings – to investigate paranormal encounters old and new.

This isn’t the first time Breedlove has set his sights on WestVirginia’s storied paranormal history, much of which has been documented by native WestVirginian Gray Barker and New Yorker John Keel; previous Small Town Monsters documentaries focus on Point Pleasant’s Mothman, the bizarre Flatwoods Mystery of Braxton County, the infamous Woodrow Derenberger roadside meeting with the mysterious Indrid Cold, and the many encounters with the fabled Men in Black. LeGro fills the viewer in on this history, together with the especially long and rich tradition of Appalachian legend and folklore that provides

A rich tradition of Appalachian folklore provides a backdrop to events

a backdrop to these more recent events. The storied Men in Black phenomenon provides him with the opportunity to freely conjecture about covert military operations in this remote military installation-heavy region, specifically the numerous sightings of advanced military aircraft flying in or out of the state’s abundant abandoned coal mines (potentially retrofitted into secret underground bases). Thankfully, rehashing old paranormal standbys and secret military ops are only the backdrop to this latest film, which focuses more on obscure regional accounts of recent UFO and alien encounters by both individuals and families. Unlike Mothman or the Men in Black, these stories benefit from the freshness and immediacy of first-hand retellings, while the former have taken on the accretions of amplification and error and become as much a part of the folklore of the region as any legends passed down from generation to generation.

Breedlove’s drone-heavy cinematography is admirable, and vast and mostly undeveloped rural West Virginia provides ample opportunities for breathtaking landscapes. At one point, the filmmakers capture unidentified aerial phenomena on camera, though what they record is rather underwhelming. Regrettably, as with his previous films, Breedlove is compelled to provide dramatic recreations of paranormal encounters that depend too much on some rather disappointing CGI effects – this is low budget filmmaking, after all – that betrays somewhat the documentary feel, and this eventually proves to be a major irritation and distraction. This unnecessary interjection and visual reductionism ultimately lessen the impact of the percipients’ first-hand accounts. Luckily, LeGro and Breedlove’s theorising resists sensationalism – they stop short of proposing another Hollow Earth theory, for example, though they flirt with notions of military activityinduced alien visitation – and the filmmakers are to be praised for offering a somewhat balanced interpretation.

Eric Hoffman

★★★ ★★

Shepherd

Created by Jez Butterworth, UK 2021

Acorn Media, £24.99 (DVD)

Sometimes a film comes along that you desperately want to enjoy but which falls short to the extent that it’s a bitter disappointment. Shepherd is an example. It’s British, it’s a thoughtful psychological horror, it has a good cast, it’s beautifully shot in some great locations: everything is in place for it to work. But it doesn’t.

Eric (Tom Hughes, who played Prince Albert in Victoria) is a monosyllabic young farmer who, mourning the death of his unfaithful wife and unborn child, takes a job as a shepherd on a remote Scottish island that boasts nothing more than a ramshackle cottage, a dilapidated lighthouse and several hundred sheep. Bidding farewell to his angry mother (an unrecognisable Greta Scacchi) he is ferried to his new home by a baleful woman (Kate Dickie) who mutters veiled warnings before departing.

Almost as soon as he arrives, Eric realises he’s in a very dark and disturbing place. He discovers a journal left by the previous shepherd which is full of fevered writing and, more alarming still, dozens of bizarre and ominous drawings. He begins to have terrifying dreams, he hears noises and eventually starts seeing things that shouldn’t be there. He comes to believe that the island is haunted by a witch – one who wants something from him.

From that synopsis you’ll be able to figure out that a lack of originality is this film’s major drawback. It ‘borrows’ from so many other horror films that despite the care it takes to develop its story, the viewer is almost always one step ahead. Unlike the similar The Lighthouse from 2019, Shepherd does not present a mystery for the viewer to figure out; you almost have to wait for the film to catch up to where you already are.

It has an arthouse horror veneer to it, but beneath that there is a reliance on fake-out dream sequences, jump scares and – worst of all – a woman with long, dark, dank hair as the monster: all stuff you’d expect to find in a cheapo horror flick from a bargain bin in the supermarket.

I’m afraid I can’t recommend Shepherd. Slow horror is fine, but it needs more meat on its bones and a more original approach than this if it’s going to work.

Daniel King

★★ ★★★