Hyde Park Pick: Leviticus

The feature debut of director Adrian Chiarella follows two teenage boys as they must grapple with a violent entity that takes the form of the person they desire most - each other.

Leviticus comes onto the scene with the support of some heavyweights, including producers who also worked on Jennifer Kent’s brilliant The Babadook as well and the amazing Talk to Me and Bring Her Back by the Philippou brothers.  

As a new director, Adrian Chiarella graduates to features with an exciting body of shorts behind him including his 2020 film, Black Lips, which won Best Short Film at Melbourne Queer Film festival. Black Lips follows a Chinese Immigrant in Australia as he navigates a solitary existence, a lonely routine contemplated hand in hand with ideas about belonging unlocked through authentic connection with ones sexual identity.

Leviticus is a completely different story but some of the themes are the same. The story is transplanted to a rural community shaped in part by the heavy weight of traditional Christian ideas about shame, sexuality and gender.

The harshness of the world made soft by the tenderness between the two leads, tenderness sought and realised. But this is a genre films…so things aren’t simple.

The film has hard moments and hard ideas making it work as a horror film whilst also feeling sincere as a coming of age story…all being one with sinister edge.