Maple Syrup Massacre is an editorial series where Joe Lipsett dissects the themes, conventions and contributions of new and classic Canadian horror films. Spoilers follow…
In the first two entries of this series – on Adam MacDonald’s Backcountry and Grant Harvey’s Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning – we spent a fair amount of time talking about the Canadian relationship to wilderness.
The outdoors – whether it be woods, open plains, mountain ranges, or desert valleys – has a mythic quality in Western and horror films. For Canadians, the wilderness is a massive part of our identity: the country has a relatively small population (38.25M in 2021, less than the state of California’s 39.34M) in a massive geographical region of 9M square kilometers (or 3,474,919 square miles).
For reference, that’s 3.9 people per square kilometer, compared to the US’s 35.3. So yeah, we’re a fairly small population in a giant geographical area.
In Australia, the vast majority of the population hugs the coast in order to avoid the extreme heat of the Outback. Canadians also tend to congregate in specific geographical areas: namely the southern border near the US. In the 2016 census, two out of three people (66%) lived within 100 kilometres (62 miles) of the US border, an area that represents only 4% of Canada’s territory (see the red line on the map above).
There’s a historical reason for this: Southern Ontario and Quebec is where English and French settler-colonialists established the fur trade back in the 16th century, it provided easy exchange of goods and services with the US, and according to historian William Lewis Morton, the area had the most arable land for agriculture.
The key take away from these statistics is a huge portion of Canada is daunting wilderness: inhospitably cold in the north, large mountain ranges in the west, and tempestuous storms in the east. These are broad generalizations, but there’s a reason why horror films, and particularly Canadian films, center around the horror of leaving the city behind.
1977’s Rituals is one such film. While the overall premise bears a slight resemblance to Deliverance – a group of men on vacation encounter a threatening presence in the woods – the Canadian film doesn’t dabble in the same kind of rural horror class critique.
Ian Sutherland’s script focuses on five doctors who vacation together each year. There’s neurologist Harry (Hal Holbrook); general surgeon Mitzi (Lawrence Dane); gay general practitioner Martin (Robin Grammell); Martin’s brother D.J. (Gary Reineke); and bad family man/buffoon, Abel (Ken James).
The film begins as the men set out on a camping and fishing trip in Northern Ontario. When Rituals opens, the men have already gathered at the outpost where the seaplane departs; the film notably contains no images of a city or even a town. From here the men becoming increasingly isolated when they’re deposited in the woods and told they’ll be picked up in six-days time.
Naturally there’s a man in the woods who bears them ill-will and kills them off one by one. Like the slasher films of the 80s, the villain is tied to a(n undercooked) back story that provides an explanation of sorts, but it’s less satisfying that the unraveling homosocial bonds between the doctors as they negotiate the perilous, rugged Canadian landscape.
From the first scene, there’s disagreement and animosity within the group. Mitski is trying to recruit Harry to come (financially) aboard a “franchise” surgery that is eventually revealed to involve penis enlargement. This opens a discussion that establishes that each man has a different philosophical and ethical approach to their practice, ranging from cosmetic and “for profit” medicine to workload and compassionate care.
All it takes is the disappearance of the group’s hiking boots on the first night to throw the personalities into even greater conflict. Control freak D.J., the only one with a second pair of shoes, ventures off solo to a nearby hydro-electric dam to get help. When he doesn’t return, the others construct rudimentary foot protection and set off after him.
Rituals includes several stand-out set pieces, many of them involving traps set up by the mysterious figure. These include a wasp attack, a harrowing river crossing featuring hidden underwater bear traps, and a shocking (and frankly nihilistic) fiery climax.
Early in the film Marty is injured and requires the use of a rudimentary stretcher that must be manually carried. His status quickly becomes the center of a moral and ethical debate. Mitzi repeatedly argues that they should abandon Marty in order to make better time, thereby increasing their likelihood of survival. Harry, however, disagrees. As the film progresses, it becomes clear that the two men have a medical history informed by shame and regret that is weighing heavily on their current situation. (Trace and I will undoubtedly tackle the casual depiction of queerness, and how it becomes “a burden” to straight men, in a future episode of Horror Queers).
While the traps prove challenging, the danger is repeatedly accentuated by the geography of Northern Ontario. From starvation to rain to threatening river currents and steep rock quarries, the men are repeatedly tested by their environment, which is captured in all of its terrifying beauty by director Peter Carter and cinematographer René Verzier.
At nearly 1 hour and forty minutes, some reviewers call the film slow-paced, particularly its character-focused last act. Unlike many other rural horror films, however, Rituals excels at balancing its moral and ethical debate with the all-encompassing threat of Nature. And in that capacity, it feels uniquely Canadian.
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