When I saw the title of this film I was immediately intrigued. I saw the cast list and knew I had to watch it when I saw Zach Gilford was in it. I loved him as Matt Saracen of course but also enjoyed him branching out into the film industry and the horror genre. He was very good in Midnight Mass!
As the film starts the cinematography was well done and the acting seemed pretty good. The couples played as couples well and the children were believable as brother and sister.
This is where the good of the movie ends. I was severely let down.
If you like films that give you absolutely no explanation for what happens, this one is for you.
***SPOILERS AHEAD***
The couples are staying in cabins in the woods to get some quality time together away from their busy lives in the city. We don't hear much about the history of the couples but eventually it's revealed that Ben (Gilford) struggles with mental illness, specifically mania. The other couple reveals that there is distance between them due to a sexual encounter they had with two other friends.
Ben leads the entire group into the woods to adventure down a path and just see what's out there. They come across an old abandoned brick building with no signs, no leftover equipment, nothing at all to indicate what it used to be. They find inside this building a deep hole/well that captures all of their attention. The children seem exceptionally caught up in it, even going trance like as they look into it. The boy refers to it as "the place that shines."
From there, we go on this crazy adventure where the children are definitely no longer children, they continually play on Ben's mental illness and are able to get him isolated from the group because the rest of them believe he just means harm to the kids. The kids speak in weird hisses and clicks, which is soon revealed to be the language they now speak because these are truly not the same children.
The kids get each adult alone individually and then try to kill them so they can bring their bodies back to the hole and dump them in, where they would presumably be revived as one of these imitation people.
Eventually, through a shadow, you learn the children have became for lack of a better word, big bugs. You never see the creature physically. You never learn why it's there. You never learn how it came to be there. You never learn what the building is or was. You never learn a single thing. The kids turn into bugs and attack the adults and try to change them as well. That's it.
I give it a 4 for some decent acting and cinematography but that's it.
As the film starts the cinematography was well done and the acting seemed pretty good. The couples played as couples well and the children were believable as brother and sister.
This is where the good of the movie ends. I was severely let down.
If you like films that give you absolutely no explanation for what happens, this one is for you.
***SPOILERS AHEAD***
The couples are staying in cabins in the woods to get some quality time together away from their busy lives in the city. We don't hear much about the history of the couples but eventually it's revealed that Ben (Gilford) struggles with mental illness, specifically mania. The other couple reveals that there is distance between them due to a sexual encounter they had with two other friends.
Ben leads the entire group into the woods to adventure down a path and just see what's out there. They come across an old abandoned brick building with no signs, no leftover equipment, nothing at all to indicate what it used to be. They find inside this building a deep hole/well that captures all of their attention. The children seem exceptionally caught up in it, even going trance like as they look into it. The boy refers to it as "the place that shines."
From there, we go on this crazy adventure where the children are definitely no longer children, they continually play on Ben's mental illness and are able to get him isolated from the group because the rest of them believe he just means harm to the kids. The kids speak in weird hisses and clicks, which is soon revealed to be the language they now speak because these are truly not the same children.
The kids get each adult alone individually and then try to kill them so they can bring their bodies back to the hole and dump them in, where they would presumably be revived as one of these imitation people.
Eventually, through a shadow, you learn the children have became for lack of a better word, big bugs. You never see the creature physically. You never learn why it's there. You never learn how it came to be there. You never learn what the building is or was. You never learn a single thing. The kids turn into bugs and attack the adults and try to change them as well. That's it.
I give it a 4 for some decent acting and cinematography but that's it.