Brad McGann's film 'In my Father's Den' starts very slowly, an account of some closed and not particularly likable brothers coming together after the funeral of their father. But their obstructive characters (and of those around them) pay dividends when they become suspects in the disappearance of a local girl; even as we learn that there's a lot of dark family history which makes them seem more understandable and sympathetic, we can also believe that they might have done something terrible; and the plot is worked out nicely. But the film isn't perfect; I like Mazzy Star, but I didn't think their music fitted well to the film; there's a reliance on arbitrarily ordered flashbacks to maintain the tension; and a certain heavy handed obviousness to the way some of the ideas are presented. The portrayal of the victim as an unusually deep soul is also unnecessary; and her supposed writings, which frame the story, are tedious and present only to assert this superfluous quality. Still, I liked the overall portrait of life in the far south of New Zealand, a place that may seem beautiful and open but which in this film, comes across as a very narrow and claustrophobic place.
Review of In My Father's Den
