This low-budget British effort is a somewhat fractured re-telling of the fairytale classic “Rumpelstiltskin”, still entitled simply Rumpelstiltskin. If you’re unfamiliar with the tale, basically a hapless peasant girl who, due to some audacious lying, finds herself faced with proving she can spin straw into gold or face execution is helped by a strange imp, fae or goblin, Rumpelstiltskin. Only he doesn’t tell her his name, and if she’s unable to guess it, Rumps will take her child.
This version of the story goes for a dark fantasy/supernatural horror tone, and neither is it the first to do so; a 1995 version starred Max Grodénchik of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, a show which itself featured the Rumpelstiltskin character in one of its lesser, early episodes. That version was seemingly produced in response to the surprising success of the fantasy slasher Leprechaun; it’s less clear what reason there is for this new version to exist, though it does vaguely tip its hat at some of the successes of modern dark fantasy; the archaic dialect and portentous chapter headings of Robert Eggars movies; the filthy dialogue of Game of Thrones – within five minutes of the production logos we’ve heard “You’d better fuck me quickly then, had you not, Woodcutter’s Boy?”, “You don’t even qualify as the town’s whore, because you lack the wit to charge for it” and, as a character gives birth, “My spirit is fine, it is my cunt that is being rended in two!” – and there is Joss Carter’s performance as Rumpelstiltskin, with the signature twitchy, Cockney-patterned eccentricity that Johnny Depp brings to Jack Sparrow, Willy Wonka, the Mad Hatter et cetera; and Hannah Baxter-Eve’s standout performance as the protagonist Miller’s Daughter squarely places the heroine in the tradition of modern feminist horror protagonists such as Florence Pugh in Midsommar, Anya Taylor-Joy in The Vvitch, and Anya Taylor-Joy in Last Night in Soho. She even has the big eyes and blonde hair.
However, while there’s no doubt that Rumpelstiltskin consciously belongs to a certain niche subgenre of recent years, it’s uncertain whether it’s likely to find an audience – other than its appearance at FrightFest Glasgow – given how its spirited script and performances only barely offset its dispiriting lack of production value. That can’t be helped; but when even something as handsome-looking and action-packed as The Northman fails to land with audiences, what hope does something so low-budget, so British and so star-free have?
★★★☆☆
Rumpelstiltskin on digital from 7 April from Miracle Media.