The Incomer is the latest in a tradition of British comedy films that utilize a frank, declarative style of dialogue and editing to exert their strangeness. The Incomer isn’t formally dishonest because its thesis is easy to gauge; people have a strange way of setting parameters on what they consider to be “normal.” Once the standard for ordinariness is disputed, it’s easy to put any standardized routine on trial, and the result is a funny comedy-of-manners with no shortage of rhetorical meandering.
Independent filmmakers often seek a narrative device that allow them to shoot in minimal locations with as few actors as possible, but The Incomer has a premise in which this stripped-down approach is preferable. The siblings Isla (Gayle Rankin) and Sandy (Grant O'Rourke) have lived on a remote island off the coast of Scotland for three decades after the death of their father, and maintained a reasonably modern home without any intrusions from outside society. Their narrowed world is suddenly impeded by the arrival of Daniel (Domhnall Gleeson), a land recovery agent who’s assigned to “relocate” the pair forcefully. Daniel doesn’t have any strong personal convictions, other than his desire to remain employed, but is greeted with hostility upon Isla’s insistence that they can’t leave.
The formula for the story would’ve seemed like a typical instance of a learned, modern character sent to a primitive culture to be “saved” from their rudimentary lifestyle, but The Incomer doesn’t treat Daniel as particularly civilized. The film’s opening is entirely focused on Isla and Sandy, and is keen to note they’re not savages; even if the concept of the internet is foreign to them, the brother-sister duo have maintained good health and remained content with their regimented schedule of hunting for survival. Daniel’s posed with a difficult question when asked about the benefits of living in a more connected, mobile world. In Isla’s eyes, access to digital shopping and a more varied diet don’t outweigh the burdens of finding employment, following procedures, and being mocked by those that degrade cultures that aren’t their own.
The Incomer is able to coast on these debates because there isn’t artificial friction that leads the characters to hastily draw conclusions. Daniel’s curious to learn more about what his new acquaintances’ lives are like, which is more difficult for Isla than it would be if he’d been vindictive. Isla’s defensiveness would suggest that she does understand that she and her brother have been cut off from certain experiences, and that she’s the only one with the ability to initiate change. Sandy’s adolescent antics grow tiresome, but it shows that he doesn’t have the capacity to question his circumstances in the same way that his sister does.
Despite the nuanced anthropological study at play, The Incomer would be dull if it was exclusively about resistance to acculturation, which is why the suggestion of the supernatural isn’t entirely jarring. Isla’s desire to remain in their familial home isn’t just founded on loyalty to her father’s wishes, but because of her sincere belief that their purpose is to protect the island’s mythological creatures from the presence of “incomers” that would destroy it. The notion of a colonizing force threatening an ancient order has some uncomfortable historical roots, but it’s also founded in the paradise myths that occur within any religion. The presence of direct fantasy components, which are lifted directly from Isla and Sandy’s didactic perception of reality, only hinder the tone when they literalize psychological coping methods that would be better implied. That doesn’t change the fact that the occasional magical creatures that pop up create some sight gags, including a particularly funny moment involving an enigmatic amphibious figure.
There needed to be a conflict in The Incomer so that there would be a countdown element for the limited time Daniel has to stay on the island, and his employer Roz (Michelle Gomez) is a suitable antagonist. Even without grafting specific political connotations onto the character, Roz is representative of the uncaring supervisor; that she’s also a guileless authoritative lapdog only makes her more detestable. Roz may be the type of uniquely uncharitable character that’s only inserted for the sake of a third-act face-off in which the protagonists are forced to air their truths, but an architectural villain isn’t out-of-place in a film that’s ostensibly framed as a fairy tale.
Gleeson, much like his father, is far more interesting when cast as oddballs and outcasts than as a leading man. Daniel’s given an opportunity where he no longer has to apologize for being “weird,” which has allows Gleeson to flex his muscles as a physical comedian. Much of the dialogue is dependent on delivery, and Gleeson’s increasingly incredulous reactions to his strangest day of employment are consistently chucklesome without being overstated.
The Incomer would be a cult classic if it didn’t hit on such universal themes of acceptance and open-mindedness; the emotional conclusions eventually reached by the film are conventional when compared to the oddness they were preceded by. The space that writer/director Louis Paxton gave to his actors to leisurely follow their characters’ evolutions is almost as admirable as the film’s lack of cynicism; The Incomer is frequently blunt, but it’s never mean-spirited.