As the complete opposite of The Re-Animator, this Lovecraftian cosmic horror, crafted by writer/director David A. Roberts (Afterlyfe, 2021) checks off every box for horror fans who want to indulge in a mystery that leaves breadcrumbs throughout the film so they can piece together what really happened in the end by themselves. Roberts is guiding the audience by asking,

‘What is this? Who is this? Is it what really happened or is he [Chris] kind of losing his mind?’ (Roberts, 2023 A).

On the surface, this film gets chaotic at times and may seem to lose its strands, but the film is very well crafted and so focused on telling this specific story that any scene taken out of the whole might destroy the balanced composition.

‘Survivor’s guilt is a very real and horrible thing,’ the director explained (Roberts, 2023 A),

and this guilt is making Chris Rivers (Rory Wilson) go and investigate what happened to his best friend Billy (Ieuan Coombs), who committed suicide, by following the clues Billy left behind for Chris to discover. This is an analysis of the film, so SPOILER WARNING!

MEANING BEHIND THE FRAMES

Important frames seem to have more meanings than what the first impression suggests. ‘The owls are not what they seem,’ said the Giant giving a clue to Special Agent Dale Cooper in the hit series Twin Peaks (Lynch/Frost, 1990).

The INTRO SEQUENCE ‘was supposed to just throw you off balance,’ the director stated (Roberts, 2023 A), but there is more to it than that. He explained the Intro encapsulates the genre, the dread and is meant as a foreshadowing of what is about to come throughout the film. Since the Intro shows completely unknown characters and doesn’t give any clues about the location, the main character or the story, one can assume it reflects the main theme abstractly. The director is adamant about spreading the word about the film being about feeling guilty in the many interviews he’s given, so it seems far-fetched to suggest that the film is actually about sacrifice …but… the Intro certainly shows a sacrifice and not an abstract way of showing anything connected to the theme of guilt.

The FIRST FRAME after the Intro sequence shows the location where most of the story will take place. It is shot from a bird’s view perspective so that most of the location is visible. There are no annoying neighbours around for miles, and Chris can be lucky if he gets any electricity in that place. Beside that obvious observation lies something else hidden in plain sight. This bird’s view perspective can also be referred to the God’s perspective. Since the film deals with a cult that wants to wake up a deity (an older God named ‘the Origin’), this shot tells the audience that the deity is already present, lurking, watching over everyone. Cinematographer Shaun Bishop describes how

‘We’re one of the people that are following him, we’re one of the people that are spying on him, we’re on his journey, we’re the little angel on his shoulder or a little devil that’s tormenting him’ (Bishop, 2023)

which is exactly like the point of view of a deity, not of an individual member of the cult, because

‘existence is an endless dream of an ancient deity’.

Billy

The whole film is told from the perspective of this deity.

The LAST TWO FRAMES of the film show a dead bird on the hospital floor and Chris’s reaction when he realizes that his troubles have just begun. That is not the only thing that these frames suggest. Since both frames are presented through darker visuals it is not far away to imagine that Chris will never be the same again and that his life will take a bad turn where he might end up as Billy did. Nothing in these two frames suggests Chris might get out of it. Also, juxtaposing the dead bird with the bright and hopeful, warm, first frame of the film, seems to suggest dark times are following.

The film is divided into THREE CHAPTERS: 1) The guilt that drowns, 2) Down the rabbit hole and 3) We Are Legion. These titles reveal how one guilt-ridden person goes into territories that he shouldn’t, but ultimately ends up becoming the problem. In this case, it is Chris, who’s feeling guilty about letting down his friend, who is going to investigate the things his friend lays out, only to become a victim himself. But there is something else, hidden behind these titles. They suggest that there is a method to the chaos, that Chris’s behaviour is a repeated behaviour, a pattern, something that he can’t or couldn’t control. Once it starts, it is impossible to end.

BILLY’S REVENGE

Immediately after hearing about Billy’s passing, Chris took off to the cottage where his friend stayed over, leaving his pregnant wife alone at home to deal with that by herself, mostly because ‘We don’t make rational decisions because of the guilt,’ explains the director Roberts (Roberts, 2023 A). Since the film deals with guilt as a main topic, it’s obvious Chris arrived at the cottage to get rid of this guilt. As a voice from the beyond, Billy left instructions for Chris to understand how he died. Billy left a big envelope full of ‘sketches, CSI photos, forensic photos,’ scientific articles and newspaper clippings in ‘Croatian, Russian or Serbian, Spanish,’ (Roberts, 2023 B) together with a USB of a video where Billy explains what happened to him and others in the last few years. He begins his speech with

‘Listen to my voice. I am breathing steady I sound fully conscious. I am not what you all think I am’ (Roberts, 2023).

Billy goes into heavy details about how he got a ‘little too deep’ into trouble and lays out the mystery he tried to solve which is meant for Chris to continue. He says,

‘Thank you for following the breadcrumbs. I knew you’d be the one to find them, and probably the only one that cared enough to look’ (Roberts, 2023).

That is a great way of saying ‘I know exactly what you are thinking and now you are inside my trap’. Why would that be a trap? According to the information the audience knows, Billy tried to contact Chris several times, but Chris swiftly avoided any contact with him, thinking he just got paranoid for unknown reasons. Billy meanwhile goes through a personal hell, because his best friend, Chris, won’t pick up the phone. Roberts remarks, ‘His friend desperately needed help and he was stepping back’ (Roberts, 2023 A). Since Billy knew his demise was inevitable, he might have thought or was forced to think ‘If I go down, you are going down with me’. Usually, if such a story happens, with the occult or someone’s life being in danger, one tends not to talk about it with loved ones to avoid bringing them into unnecessary danger. Not with Billy. Billy, instead of dealing with the problem by himself, leads his best friend right into the hands of cold-blooded maniacs as a gift, demanding,

‘You have the package I sent you and the address to bring it to’ (Roberts, 2023).

Everything is prearranged, and Chris is served on a platter.

Billy is conveniently shot in blue tones in his video, a colour that represents distance, sadness, bleakness and hopelessness. Chris on the other hand is covered in warm tones, as to explain how Billy and Chris may have been complete opposites. It also becomes evident that throughout this video, Billy never goes into any personal chatter or mentions something that only he and Chris alone would understand since they are best friends. No, Billy is very formal, explaining the assignment like a scientist would to his assistants (of course, this is also to sound as rational as he can be). Billy would know since he’s gone through the same ordeal, that once you are messing with the cult or some unknown deity, there is no turning back. He even boldly admits that this encounter brings people ‘to the psych ward or suicide’ (Roberts, 2023). Since he is pissed at Chris for breaking his trust, he calmly speaks the words and leads him into a trap. This is also confirmed in the explanation about the mission of the cult, that they want to ‘put an end to a universe that ignores them’ (Roberts, 2023) just like Chris foolishly ignored Billy.

DID CHRIS DESERVE THIS?

Chris Rivers is a very weak man. The audience sees that he feels guilty about leaving Billy to his demise and now when Billy is dead, he suddenly wants to make things right.

• He left his wife at the same moment that she needed his help, just as he left Billy when he needed him the most. And he is not feeling guilty at all about that.

• While talking to his other friend, John, who blames him for not being there for his wife’s pregnancy, he gets furious and throws his mobile phone into the field (his only connection to the outside world and his wife for that matter).

• While imagining how Billy might have died, he can’t stand how guilty he feels and throws up. This might not make him a weak man, but it shows that he has emotions. But later on, by seeing Billy on the video recording, he doesn’t show any kind of emotion towards seeing the last image of his close and dear friend. No remorse, no tears, no surprise. He listens carefully and does whatever Billy tells him to do, out of sheer guilt and that makes him a weak man.

• Chris is easily scared and not really physically capable of defending himself against two or more men if they would attack him. Since Billy knows what the cult does and that they don’t shy away from a sacrifice as seen in the Intro sequence, one can assume Chris was chosen because he is weak and would be the perfect sacrificial goat.

The director deducts that

‘It’s absolutely Chris’s fault’ (Roberts, 2023 A)

for everything that’s happened to him, and that is also why he shouldn’t go unpunished. Chris is meant to go out to the perfect place to fall ‘into madness in like one location in a cottage the middle of nowhere,’ explained Roberts (Roberts, 2023 B). He didn’t learn a thing throughout this bizarre encounter in the wild, so he didn’t deserve a happy ending.

THE MARKINGS

During the film, the most striking visual is the circle within the circle marking on the backs of the victims seen in the countless photographs Billy has gathered. Unfortunately, in the whole film, there is not a single explanation about what these markings may be. Victims are marked, but what does this symbol represent?

The spiritual meaning of the circle within the circle ‘transcends religious and cultural boundaries. It is often seen as a representation of the divine or the infinite. The concentric circles symbolize the layers of existence and consciousness, with the inner circle representing the individual self and the outer circle representing the universal consciousness or higher power’ (Thompson, 2023). It perfectly fits into the concept of the film, the ‘Origin’ is the divine deity (the outer circle) and first Billy, then Chris, are the horrifically insignificant individuals represented through the inner circle. With that line that slashes through both circles, it only can mean that both are crossed out. Both, the individual and the deity need to disappear. Also, there is a visual inside the film, that might visually represent the circle within the circle as well and is connected to the voice of deity ‘the Origin’.

The deity should not speak to Chris, not this early in point and time. He just came to the cottage, opened the envelope and heard Billy’s message. There is no way he might be able to reach out to a deity without any connection to the cult and vice versa. Or he just might be able to do that, because he is already targeted for a longer period?

THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE

Many might believe that Billy tried to get away from the cult since one of the cult members told their version of the story of how Billy was a coward and that he denied his blessings. But upon closer inspection, one can’t be sure, because the cult member is projecting images into Chris’s mind, and the audience accepts what it sees. It might not be what really happened. There are two options:

• IT HAPPENED HOW THE CULT MEMBER DESCRIBED IT. Billy tried to get away, killing the guy who was chosen to bring Billy back into the cult, suffocating him with a bag over his head, no less, immediately transforming Billy into a murderer. Billy tried to get away and they eventually got him. He didn’t commit suicide, he was murdered and they all left ‘him in the outhouse’ (Roberts, 2023). According to the cult member, Billy ‘was weak’ (Roberts, 2023). Even Billy in the dream sequence near the end of the film kinda confirms,

‘Their lies trying to make you see what isn’t there’ (Roberts, 2023).

• IT DIDN’T HAPPEN AS THE CULT MEMBER DESCRIBED IT. Chris is only seeing images according to the things he hears from the vicious cult member. For all the audiences know, Billy could be the sacrificial lamb in the Intro sequence from the film and before his death, he had to choose their next victim because the cult lives outside of civilization, they don’t have an easy time gathering victims as they please. Victims need to be lured into their trap and Billy had someone who he wished should be punished. Chris asked the man renting him the cottage, ‘Do you get many guests here these days?’ to which the man replied, ‘Not these days’ (Roberts, 2023).

Upon hearing the story about Billy being weak, but actually going against the wicked cult bunch, Chris finds some courage within himself and rams a stick into his neck killing himself rather than being sacrificed. He thought Billy did the same, that he would rather commit suicide than be sacrificed by the cult as stated in the dream sequence. Chris asks Billy ‘You did the same as me?’ and Billy answers the way Chris would liked Billy to answer, confirming with a ‘Maybe’ (Roberts, 2023). Chris survives his own staking and ends up in a hospital, found by the police officer he contacted when he first saw the cult member stalking him outside the cottage. It is a mystery why the cult just left him there. They could easily take him with them, patch him up, sacrifice him. But they just left. All this trouble for nothing? If they took him and the police couldn’t find him, that would point to Chris being kidnapped, giving away the involvement of an enemy, at the same cottage where Billy was found dead. Billy was murdered, but the official explanation is that he committed suicide, probably because of the lack of evidence found at the scene. If he was murdered that should have been pretty obvious, or the police didn’t do their homework (also, the police might be in the cult too, since he didn’t want to show his ID to Chris when he asked for it).

FINAL WORD

Even though it is not clear most of the time what is going on in the film, it never loses its focus or goes haywire. It might be ‘a bit of a slow burn film’ (Roberts, 2023 A), Roberts justifies himself, but that is to be expected so the mystery can unfold in proper rhythm. The director uses many influences throughout the film to make fans of that genre very happy; Hellraiser (Barker, 1987), Rosemary’s Baby (Polanski, 1968) and In the Mouth of Madness (Carpenter, 1994) to name a few. Although the theme of the film is about guilt, it is overshadowed by the theme of sacrifice; Billy sacrificed his life, the cult is constantly sacrificing victims to wake up the Origin and Chris sacrificed his fulfilled life for a hopeless one to be freed of his nagging guilt.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ivotres Littles – Horror Movies and Beyond, Older Gods (2023) Lovecraftian Horror – INTVW w/director David A. Roberts | Horror Movies and Beyond, Older Gods (2023) Lovecraftian Horror – INTVW w/director David A. Roberts | Horror Movies and Beyond (youtube.com), 2023 A.

Lynch, David, Frost, Mark, Twin Peaks, Lynch/Frost Productions, 1990.

Roberts, David A., Older Gods, Wagyu films, 2023.

Roberts, David A., Making of OLDER GODS – Preparing for the shoot (Feat. David A. Roberts), Making of OLDER GODS – Preparing for the shoot (Feat. David A. Roberts) (youtube.com), 2023 B.

Thompson, Sarah, Circle Within a Circle Meaning: Origins, Symbolism And Significance, Circle Within A Circle Meaning: Origins, Symbolism, And Significance – InnerHunches, 2023.