“What if we’re dead? We wouldn’t know if we died.”
Reality can be a funny thing. What is it, really? Is it the shared experiences that we live through every day of our lives? Or is it more subjective, with each one of us crafting our own reality through the lenses of our personal experiences and mental health? If we believe it wholeheartedly to be real, does it ultimately matter where the truth lies?
The Lodge begins with a distracted mother, Laura (Alicia Silverstone, Clueless), dropping off her children, Aidan (Jaeden Martell, It) and Mia (Lia McHugh, Marvel’s Eternals), with her husband Richard (Richard Armitage, The Hobbit Trilogy), whom we soon learn she is separated from. Richard pulls Laura aside to inform her that he would like to finalize their divorce because he is planning on marrying his girlfriend, Grace (Riley Keough, Logan Lucky). As you might expect, this does not sit well with Laura.
Fast forward six months. Richard informs the children that he and Grace are going to marry and that he would like her to join them on their annual Christmas trip to their lakeside lodge. The two children, resentful and distrustful of Grace, are very resistant to this plan. Nevertheless, the excursion goes down as planned, but not before Aidan and Mia discover Grace’s dark, tragic past: She was the lone survivor of a Jim Jones-esque religious cult mass suicide when she was a young teen.
After a few days at the snowy retreat, Richard is called away on business for a few days, leaving the kids with stepmom-to-be Grace. Following some awkwardness and an aloof attitude from the children, Aidan especially, the relationship seems to be slowly thawing between Grace and the two. This is in stark contrast to the relentless blizzard that has blanketed the area with snow and cut the trio off from society, not helped at all by the fact that they also have no transportation. The situation takes a decidedly dangerous and bewildering turn when they wake to find that the power is out, the water pipes frozen, the fridge emptied, and all their possessions missing, not the least of which is Grace’s prescription medication, presumably for PTSD or some other mental illness. With their cell phones now rendered useless with no battery life left and no way of recharging, the group is completely cut off from the outside world. And with the weather growing worse seemingly by the minute and their resources rapidly dwindling, the prospects of survival for the trio grow all the more bleak as we barrel towards the shocking conclusion.
To go too much more into detail would be a disservice to the film. Suffice it to say, the story takes a number of twists and turns as it snowballs toward its conclusion, many of which left this reviewer questioning what was real and what may be imagined. Co-directors and screenwriters Severin Fiala and Veronkia Franz (Goodnight Mommy), along with co-writer Sergio Casci, have crafted an original tale that plays off what we think may be unfolding based off our previous experiences with isolation horror films, only to subvert our expectations at multiple points along the way.
The Lodge is beautifully shot, with the snow-covered locale being as central to the story as the three leads. Many of the visuals look straight out of an American Gothic-era painting, with the bleak, deserted atmosphere serving to put the audience increasingly more on edge. Within that isolated setting, one can’t help feeling the influence of John Carpenter’s paranoia-driven classic The Thing. In fact, Grace and the children are watching The Thing on TV at one spot in the film, clearly included to drive the point home.
The performances of the three leads is nothing short of outstanding. Riley Keough is phenomenal in what turns out to be a very complex role. She excels at seamlessly transitioning from being distant to furious to nearly catatonic. Her work, along with the direction of Fiala and Franz, carries the film, similar to what Toni Collette accomplished in Ari Aster’s Hereditary. This is not to say that Martell and McHugh don’t carry their weight in the movie. The two child actors are tasked with some very emotionally challenging roles and they both manage to shine in this capacity.
Fiala and Franz have crafted a memorable psychological, isolation horror-thriller in The Lodge that, in addition to The Thing, also recalls Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. High praise, I know, and I’m not saying it is on the level of those masterpieces, but it is a riveting horror-suspense the likes of which we haven’t seen in a very long time. And unlike those films, The Lodge takes place in the era of the internet and cell phones. Without those heavily-relied upon resources, the predicament seems even more perilous than it might have been in a more technologically-bereft past setting. Haunting, unnerving, and deeply disturbing, The Lodge is one of those films that will stay with you long after you leave the theater.
The Lodge is set to release on February 7, 2020 from NEON.
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