On Film: Black Sheep

Written and Directed by Jonathan King

Starring Nathan Meister, Danielle Mason, Peter Feeney, Tammy Davis, Glenis Levestan

Black Sheep is another entry into one of my favorite subgenres, the comedy/horror film. Jonathan King, who clearly took some pages from the early Peter Jackson playbook, has given us an amusing yet gory romp through the lovely New Zealand countryside, complete with rolling green hills, flesh-eating sheep and giant “Ovithropes”, which is a word I just made up to show how clever I can be.

The Movie

Henry Oldfield (Nathan Meister) grew up on a sheep farm and never got over being terrorized by his cruel older brother Angus (Peter Feeney) with a sheep carcass the same moment he was told their father had died. Fifteen years later he has returned to the farm, still suffering from his paralyzing phobia of sheep or, as he describes later in the film, “the irrational fear that someday, something exactly like this would happen”. Meanwhile, greedy brother Angus is preparing to unveil his genetically engineered sheep and animal-rights crusaders Grant (Oliver Driver) and Experience (Danielle Mason) are spying on the secret Frankensheep laboratories.

While Henry is cringing in a taxi surrounded by a herd of still-docile sheep and Angus is practicing his speech, overanxious Grant steals what he hopes is evidence of the wrong-doings going on at the farm. A glass jar is broken, a zomboid lamb embryo complete with dragging umbilical cord pops out and both carnage and hilarity ensue. Sheep become mad, flesh-hungry beasts and this toxic rabies can turn a man into a giant man-sheep if he isn’t eaten up first, which is usually the case.

This is a comedy, both dark and light. The film is very gory and very bloody and very violent and probably a couple of other “verys” as well, but I think that it is primarily trying to be funny. First time writer/director Jonathan King has made an excellent horror/comedy that is very much in the style of fellow countryman Peter Jackson, but King couldn’t be accused of copying him. Unlike Jackson’s brilliant Dead Alive and aptly-titled Bad Taste where the characters seem to be a little over-the-top, the characters here are, at least at first, completely believable.  The pacing was quick, the cinematography was often beautiful and in the end I felt that the movie was too short.

The inevitable site gag about sex with sheep is well timed and may have gotten the biggest laugh of the film. Even after all the death and destruction, the ending of Angus and his monster sheep was a moment that fans of South Park would be proud of. Everyone’s performance was great, although I would like to have seen more of kind, shotgun wielding Mrs. Mac (Glenis Levestam) or the Dr. Mengele of sheepdom, Dr. Rush (Tandi Wright). The overall blend of humor and horror left many in the theater applauding and ready to go out and eat some lamb chops before the lamb chops ate

us.

Many speculative films have an underlying theme or message that try to hold a mirror up to us and see us and our world is a different way. Night of the Living Dead, for example, has been hailed as great political commentary in its’ day and many of the early Star Trek and Twilight Zone episodes verged on being downright preachy. If Black Sheep is supposed to be a cautionary tale about the treatment of animals or destroying our planet, it failed. With Experience, there are too many hippyish new age, save-the-planet, such as her caring more about Feng Shui that splattered blood, lighting a candle for aromatherapy while escaping from a ravenous herd or holding Henry and Tucker (Tammy Davis) at gunpoint while threatening them with “the biggest sit-in this farm has ever seen”. This possible failure doesn’t take away from the enjoyment value from the film, since I’m sure it’s been years since any of you saw a horror film to learn about ecological responsibility.

Overall, the special effects were well done. The ripped flesh, piles of intestines and angry sheep of doom are all grossly realistic with only a few exceptions, such as the lamb on fire in the middle of the film. One particularly good transformation from man to “Sheepmonster” was reminiscent of the classic changeover from American Werewolf in London. 

King handled a difficult subgenre with style and precision where a less talented filmmaker might have turned this into another Night of the Lepus. While this is no Shaun of the Dead (the Citizen Kane of horror/comedies), Black Sheep is well worth seeing. Find this film and go with friends. If they’re squeamish, have dinner first. This film even has one of my favorite tag lines of all time: The Violence of the Lambs.

** Note: I think that Ovithropes is the Latin term for

Were-Sheep just as Lycanthrope is another word for

Werewolf. I’ll stop being clever now.

8/10

Fred Grimm