VIGIL

VIGIL combines fantasy, adventure and folklore in a film of psychological depth and surreal, almost cruel beauty. The central character is Toss (Fiona Kay), an 11-year-old tomboy whose imaginative perceptions of life on an isolated New Zealand valley farm enclose her in a fantastic universe. After Toss' father dies in a mountain fall, a forbidding-looking hunter becomes part of that universe, regarded by Toss as an intruder as predatory as the hawks that fly incessantly over the rocky, misty landscape. For Toss' grandfather, who needs someone to share the labor and his fanciful inventions, the stranger is a godsend. For her mother, the newcomer reawakens long-awaited repressed desires. But the young girl keeps a wary and intense vigil over all.