Gay Teens Fight The Monster Created By Homophobia
If “Leviticus” becomes a hit, one hopes that it might create space for further queer voices in horror. NEON By Steve Erickson GCN Steeped in loneliness, queer director Adrian Chiarella’s “Leviticus” is set in a dusk of the soul. The film’s look reeks of depression. Taking place in a small Australian town where standing in line at a deli is one of the few leisure options, it turns the countryside into a manmade void. (Chiarella says “we purposefully set the film in a regional town where there’s this industrial boneyard of old factories that was built around a church.”) Its lighting glares with shades of yellow that don’t come from the sun. The score creates tension with a steady hum of electronic buzzing. Institutions like school, organized religion, and their families have failed its protagonists, gay teenagers Naim (Joe Bird) and Ryan (Stacy Clausen). A girl is attacked by an unseen force while taking a shower. The audience can see her head but can’t understand the...
