So trippy it makes Ben Wheatley’s A Field in England look like an afternoon at the tax office, Dublin director Lorcan Finnegan’s debut sprig of sylvan-psych makes up for its occasional heavy tread with outstanding photography. Alan McKenna is a middle-aged surveyor with a curdling home life, sent out to chart ancient woodlands in preparation for development. But his surveyor’s pendulum is acting up, he witnesses strange figures in the morning mists, and, when his assistant-cum-lover (Niamh Algar) arrives, it’s clear his spiritual compass is erring, too.
A clear subscriber to the school of the atmospheric slow build over the jump-shock, it’s a shame Finnegan is too eager to will-o-the-wisp us down predictable paths – as he does with some unsubtle plotting, and diary entries from a mysterious antecedent flagging up the eco-agenda. But once it strays off into the realm of pure visuals, he and cinematographer Piers McGrail – using spectral lighting shifts, lens distortions and good old-fashioned creepy gnarled boughs – unleash something special. At last, Without Name taps a tart and heady sap.
