Nightstream 2020: ‘Darkness’ captures ongoing struggle of women against the patriarchy

Women have been gaslighted since the dawn of time, and major motion pictures are no strangers to exploring such menacing, ever-present terror. From 1944’s Gaslight to such 2020 films as The Invisible Man, the male species has long employed perceived dominance as a weapon to suppress women not only from climbing the social ladder but to torture them on a deeply emotional and pychological level. It’s a learned behavior spanning centuries, an oppression that’s reared its ugly head the last five years, and men have predominantly been the culprits (let’s forget noted female complicity, especially amongst white women, for a second).

Filmmaker Emanuela Rossi analyzes continued oppression with her directorial feature film debut Darkness, originally titled Buio, co-written with Claudio Corbucci, in which three young girls are abused and traumatized by their father amidst a post-apocalyptic hellscape. 17-year-old Stella (Denise Tantucci) stands tall as the film’s central protagonist, and alongside her younger sisters Luce (Gaia Bocci) and Aria (Olimpia Tosatto), she must concede in the belief that her father (Valerio Binasco) is telling them the truth about the outside world, having been ravaged by a series of solar explosions. The story goes, the sun burnt out and cast its flames over all the earth, extinguishing most life and leaving nothing but charred ruins of a once-thriving industrial age.

Any time he leaves the vacuum-sealed underground shelter (think 10 Cloverfield Lane), their father zips into a hazmat suit, graps a hunter’s backpack, and trods off into God only knows what awaits behind those plastic walls. Entering her teenage years, Stella begins to question the validity of the world; she once knew a vibrant, carefree life (and a doting boyfriend) up until sixth grade. She doesn’t remember much about what exaclty occurred, but she knows her mother was violently killed in what appears to be an extinction event on par with the dinosaurs’ swift demise. So, the young girls’ days are now filled with ’80s aerobic exercise tapes, homework, and making dollies out of paper.

One morning, after Father leaves to scavenge for food and supplies, the steel-clad front door is left ajar. Inquisitive as she is, Aria, who happens to be mute, slips into the outside world for the very first time. Stella soon discovers her absence, and without thinking, bolts into the unknown to save her. What transpires next, making up the film’s bulky runtime, can’t be aptly expressed without spoiling key points ⏤ but let’s just say, Stella must confront the monsters of the world before they totally eat them alive.

Darkness firmly grounds itself in reality, and you firmly trust what you’re seeing. It’s timeliness could not be more on the nose, but women’s fight to be seen, heard, and believed is not a new conceit. The curtain has just been drawn, letting in all the toxic vermin to expose themselves in poisonous online vitriol and through victims’ immense bravery to come forward into the light. Rossi’s storytelling is beautifully plain and direct (as are the acting performances), opting for a slice of real misery and urgency than any kind of frivolous fantasy.

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