Director: Randy Kent
Year: 2024
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Supernatural
Plot:
Following the death of her sister, a woman is sent away to a remote cottage in the wilderness to help get over the incident, but after arriving a series of strange incidents cause her to believe that she’s become targeted by a special cult looking for her to be their next sacrifice.
Review:
Overall, this was a fairly fun and enjoyable feature. One of the finer aspects present with this one is the generally impressive setup involving the trip out to the remote cottage and how her presence there involves her in the strange cult. The initial arrival at the cabin and the meet-up with the strange owner and her even stranger daughter starts things quite well by sending her out to the location to rest and recharge following her sister’s death and coming across the creepy owners. Though given that prominent and ever-present sense of warmth and familiarity, the veneer of malicious intent behind everything makes their greetings and introduction feel all the more mysterious during these interactions.
That sets the film up for a solid bit of supernatural-tinged charges the more this carries on. Knowing that there’s a nice bit of suspense throughout the cottage with the initial setup and mysterious objects disappearing around her that offer up clues as to the locals’ intentions, the whole thing reeking of old-world mysticism and supernatural beliefs offers a nice bit of groundwork for what’s to come. The gradual reveal of the whole operation being a front for the type of occult pagan ceremony that’s in store for her during this section allows for some chilling confrontations throughout here which offers up the kind of setup necessary for some great escapes throughout the house as she tries to continually get out of the house to safety and stop their plans, making for some solid positive points here.
There aren’t too many factors that hold this one down. Among the main drawbacks to the film is a rather bizarre and seemingly useless storyline beat about a flashback involving the presence of the father turning to a series of controversial measures to try to make sure she’s safe from others as a child. This comes off as nothing more than an excuse for an extended cameo from the performers involved in the scenes which has little context for what else is going on around the film, given that it’s built mainly on how the series of revelations impact her in the future which is somewhat unnecessary for how it gets included here. As well, there are also the low-budget limitations that arrive here that look quite obvious, especially the gore and bloodshed with the CGI effects being immensely underwhelming and taking the viewer out enough here to be the main drawbacks to this one.
Overview: ***.5/5
Quite fun for what it is while only being let down by a few minor factors, there’s a lot to like here while only being let down by a few slight drawbacks that keep it down. Those who are fine with this kind of approach, appreciate indie folk-horror like this one, or are fans of the creative crew will have the most to like while most others out there should heed caution.
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