The Golden: A Proof-of-concept on Infinite Grief and an Apocalypse in Its Shadow

The proof-of-concept of Luke LoCurcio’s The Golden sets up the promise of an apocalyptic sci-fi—something like Arrival meets Nope possibly meets Annihilation—wrapped around a core of loss and heartbreak. At eighteen minutes, it presents the full opening sequence, the inciting incident, and the first plot point, leaving the last few minutes for a summation of the rest.

Julie Therond stars as Grace, a woman content with her life in the countryside with her husband John (Michael Lagsner), little daughter Mary (Lily Endres), and many chickens. The film hammers in the initial harmony with a sequence detailing the land and a literary voiceover narration that, despite the wistfulness, is delivered with an elegance that signals enough room for quiet reflection. It’s a quiet world Grace has maintained: we are introduced to her in the literal hush of the morning.

But when tragedy crosses paths with her, the peaceful, introspective life is viciously upturned. The woods take on new character, something bitter and scarred. The static and crackle of a larger world drown out the unfolding of blossoms, the flapping of butterfly wings, the flourishing of chickens. Her very view of her world is permanently disfigured while the home implodes. In this flipped over world, even a black hole does not assure oblivion, or clouds gentle rain.

As personal loss gives way to global trouble, which in turn threatens her domestic life once again, Grace is given the choice to radically transform herself and take charge of a situation that may just be beyond comprehension. In the process, the tidy roles of husband and wife are faced with the choice between change and extinction. While Therond was already a rather commanding figure, if initially subsumed in the image of her traditional character, the addition of a certain spoiler-free accessory distilled the effect. Though, perhaps because we have seen the rawness of its cause, it leans far more heavily towards hurt and bitterness than the swashbuckling daring-do of a cowboy, or the stoic coolness of Imperator Furiosa.

The Golden sets up its audience to expect a payoff on a scale of those earlier mentioned films, certainly in terms of plot, if not necessarily the budget. To add to the apocalypse plot and its inevitable echo of the pandemic, there is already VFX use here to give the antagonist a visual form. And for all its introductory simplicity, the threat is, in fact, forbidding. What sort of terror consumes all light and croons wretched sound? We find out when The Golden gets made.

Watch The Golden – Proof of Concept Short Film