Review: Darkfield is terrifyingly real
presented by Realscape Productions
The most terrifying thrillers on film are those that allow their audience to imagine themselves in the shoes of their fear-stricken characters. Watching someone lose themselves in the face of otherworldly threats isn’t affecting unless you can clearly picture yourself falling apart alongside them. So, knowing that immersion is the most impactful way to tell a scary story, and knowing that I quiver at the slightest hint of suspense, I voluntarily (stupidly?) booked myself in for DARKFIELD: a collection of two immersive multi-sensory experiences in the darkness at the Powerhouse Museum.
On a calm Friday evening, two ominously blank, 40ft white shipping containers stood on the concrete with a smattering of rugged-up patrons hovering around, awaiting instructions. The installation appeared to be unmanned, like it had been beamed down by an intergalactic force onto this particular piece of unsuspecting asphalt. The two containers gave very little indication of what we were about to encounter. In an attempt to curb my anxiety, I had read up on the experience beforehand and context clues led me to believe that SÉANCE would be an American Horror Story-style roleplay into a witchy ritual, and FLIGHT would work all of my nightmares about planes into one alarmingly life-like half hour.
I was ushered into SÉANCE first, the heavy creak of the metal door shutting us all into a starkly-lit container, a single lightbulb hanging in the centre of the room. A long table ran down the middle of the space, lined on either side by rows of sturdy wooden chairs. Lines of headphones along the wall were the only indication that this was an elaborate play. I sat down, and remembering the usher’s warning about tucking our bags under our seats so they wouldn’t get in the way of the production, started to imagine all of the ways this could go. The surface in front of me was covered in a heavy plastic tablecloth that reached the floor on both sides. Could someone be hiding underneath it? Was it going to be the setting for a faux-gory dissection? Were actors going to run past my feet, brushing by me as they went? Worst of all — would I be expected to participate?
My heartbeat quickened and all light was suddenly drained from the room. Pitch black. The experience was narrated by a character who seemingly addressed the room, walking around frightening the people seated around you, as they responded in your headphones. The floor creaked and shifted as though weighted footsteps were thudding up and down the length of the room, and by the time they came to a stop in front of you, it was impossible to tell whether they were real or fake. I didn’t dare move as the voice in my headphones instructed me to put my hands atop the table, threatening me with an unstable demonic summoning if I didn’t comply. Wet, monstrous noises moved about my ears and chaotic, metallic thudding shook my seat as the séance went south. The reassurance I had been repeating for myself (it’s all in your headphones, none of this is real) slipped away from me and I came to terms with dying at the hands of a monster of my own creation, by disobeying the narrator in my ears.
As soon as the lights came on, I felt ridiculous. How childish and dramatic to have come to terms with my own death because I was a bit afraid of the noise happening in my headphones. We stepped out into the night and made our way over to the second part of our evening, FLIGHT. FLIGHT continued in the same vein, though the container was filled with an eerily life-like replication of an aircraft cabin — down to the safety briefing tucked into the seat pocket in front of us. The pitch-black replication of a flight going down is as terrifying as you would imagine, and not something I would recommend if you are planning to board an aeroplane in the next month at least.
I thought that I would be able to outsmart DARKFIELD by using logic and reason with myself as it was happening, but the Realscape team have put together a production that carefully rides the line between fantasy and reality so well that you are forced to surrender yourself to the experience. It is absolutely terrifying. What could easily have been a gimmicky foray into terror-for-the-sake-of-it, was a production that forced us to make a very distinct decision about where our body ended and our imagination began. The existential implications of being afraid of a pair of noise-cancelling headphones in a dark room were interesting enough to leave me wondering for hours after it ended.
DARKFIELD’s immersive experiences are running at the Powerhouse Museum until 28 May 2023. Find tickets and information here (Brisbane, you’re next).
Rebecca Cushway is a radio host blessed with the most luxurious radio voice in the Inner West and burdened with the ability to do everything everywhere all at once. She’s not nearly as smart as the undergrads she tutors at UTS think she is.
This review was generously donated by Bec.
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