The Incongruous Wood: Nature as a Necromancer for the Grotesque
The woods are a long-standing motif in horror fiction, from hidden cottages and castles inhabited by the mad and bloodthirsty to the well-known zombie-surrounded cabin in the deep and desolate forest. Its presence creates a space that signifies the unknown in its purest form. Not only do the woods insight fear, they can also be presented as a receptacle for the grotesque, where the woods receive and, in a sense, resurrect the dead, giving life to inanimate objects, trauma and memory. Horror films do not have to be ecological in nature to utilize the woods in a necromantic manner, but integrating the mystery of the natural world into any storyline creates a bridge between nature and our own deep-rooted fears of its power to resurrect what we dispose of within its vast confines. Whether it’s the discovery of a body buried in a shallow grave, the remnants of satanic magic in the brush or the finding of a baseball cap lost long ago on a hike, the woods have a way of resurrecting the forgotten, the disposed of and the detested.
In Matthew Holness’ 2018 film Possum, the wood uses its necromantic powers to stop Phillip, played brilliantly by Sean Harris, from discarding an extremely horrifying puppet shrouded in memories of the past that seem to have driven him mad. Phillip is an eccentric and seemingly disgraced puppeteer who has returned to the squalor of his gloomy childhood home in which his skin-crawlingly wicked uncle Maurice (played by Alun Armstrong) still resides. Phillip has the ostensibly subconscious motive of facing, and letting go of, the darkness that encapsulates his youth whilst running away from an evil of some other kind. However, Phillip’s puppet Possum is the true main character in the film. If anything, Possum has far more control over Phillip than Phillip could have ever extended over the cursed object.
Phillip’s uncle Maurice and his own puppet creation
Phillip’s burning need to dispose of Possum is multifaceted: it is not merely about the puppet itself, but what it seems to represent. The film is filled with ethereal and frightening images of Possum coming to life, flashbacks of the past and glimpses of events that are real to Phillip, potentially unreal to the rest of the world. Inside of the valise, Possum is accompanied by Phillip’s disgrace, embarrassment and, quite possibly, the body of a boy gone missing upon Phillip’s arrival back home. The valise radiates an eye-watering energy that can strangely be felt through the screen, and it is this energy that leads Phillip to wonder if the puppet is responsible for the missing boy. Phillip must snuff out this looming terror. Is it this that drives Phillip to the wood, and what is he truly attempting to be rid of? Whatever it is, Possum won’t stop coming back. Nature resurrects Possum in its physical form, creeping down hallways, twitching in corners and hanging on the wall of Phillip’s home, strangely dead and full of life all at once.
Phillip and Possum
Phillip makes multiple attempts to dispose of the puppet. He dumps Possum into the reservoir, lights it on fire and abandon’s it in the thick of the wood. Yet nature has other plans, returning Possum to the disdain of its ‘master’ not only as a tangible object, but as the subject of creepy childhood incantations Phillip jots down in a notebook that is just as terrifying as Possum itself. The scribblings are reminiscent of aggressive circles and demons dug into printer paper with broken red crayon by possessed children, art easily interpretable as evil yet to come. No matter how Phillip tries to be rid of Possum, nature is an almost constant choice of receptacle. The film’s etiolated look, not unlike an old faded family photograph, and the beautifully grimy palette, dawdling black balloons side by side with greens reminiscent of industrial waste bring the woods to post-apocalyptic life, making its power to resurrect Phillip’s demons and Possum even more unsettling.
The most striking attempt to be rid of the grotesque creature occurs in a brilliant scene where Phillip takes the puppet to a tree in the wood that strikingly resembles the ticking, spider-like legs of Possum. The tree cradles the bag in which the puppet (or the missing boy?) resides in such a loving way that Phillip’s anxiety and trauma appear to be the only true evil in that sacred space. In an almost sacrificial action, Phillip gives Possum to nature, who has other plans. This is the point where I realized (maybe a bit late) that Possum’s face mirrors the face of Sean Harris too much to not be deliberate, forcing him to stare idly at his own death mask day in and day out whilst he continues to live and breathe. The forest, again and again, resurrects the abandoned puppet, pushing Phillip to face the ugliness that drove him home to greasy old Maurice in the first place.
Phillip in the forest
Both the real and the unreal are lost in the soot and the grime that Phillip’s home is made of. The life that, collectively, the water, the forest and the industrial wasteland that is Phillip’s hometown have given to Possum is never explained, pushing the audience, and Phillip, to believe he himself was never anything more than a mad and haunted man. Ever winding through the wood, the constant cycle of Possum’s destruction and resurrection seems to mirror the inner workings of Phillip’s psyche. It is clear that Phillip has his own necromantic forest within his mind that constantly forgets and revives the misery of his childhood in a feeble attempt to be rid of it, to understand why these evils continue to play dead only to have poisonous life-giving breath spur their return. To me, Possum is not only about giving power to pain through neglect. Without being an eco-horror, it illustrates through the juxtaposition of industrial space and natural space the relentlessness of the forest, its purity and refusal to be tainted by alien things that do not belong. The natural world, like the puppet Possum, does not allow us to ignore the ugliness within ourselves (all of this comes together at the end and, two years later, I am still shaken by the much welcome twist).
Possum was quite easily one of my favorite horrors of 2018, as it hurt and strangely warmed me simultaneously. Holness and Harris have created a character in Phillip that absolutely breaks your heart. This film is a reminder of the psychologically inescapable and acts as a reminder that past trauma and memory of pain can undulate when ignored. It is also a reminder that the forest does not mess around: if you find yourself in a thicket of trees trying to dispose of a frightening puppet that is reflective of your bad behavior or childhood trauma, know that your ass is grass and the forest has a lawnmower. You’re getting that puppet back my friend, and you can’t do anything about it.
The unforgiving Possum
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