Directed By Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz

Starring – Riley Keough, Jaeden Lieberher, Lia McHugh

The Plot – A soon-to-be-stepmom (Keough) is snowed in with her fiance’s (Richard Armitage) two children (Lieberher, McHugh) at a remote holiday village. Just as relations finally begin to thaw between the trio, strange and frightening events threaten to summon psychological demons from her strict religious childhood.

Rated R for disturbing violence, some bloody images, adult language and brief nudity

POSITIVES

– Disturbing presentation. This film and its scares are nothing but one hundred percent atmospheric, and it attains this consistency of dread with a complex shot composition that slowly burns the wick of the candle known as anxiety. The slow pans both inward and outward hint that something deeply unsettling is taking shape in every pivotal interaction between these isolated people, but beyond that it’s the way the editing stays reserved in its approach, forcing us the audience to endure what the characters are without disruption. There’s also a fine dependency on tight, claustrophobic cinematography by Thimios Bakatakis, which can not only be used to establish the tight isolation that the characters endure for a few days, but also in how the kids see their opposition, in all of her cryptically calculated movements. It focuses so tightly on her facial registries in particular, which in turn allows us to dissect what is taking shape mentally, as to where a lesser written script would expose such advantages in its spoon-fed dialogue.

– Compositional identity. There are very few films anymore with the kind of music that you can tie to only one distinct film, but “The Lodge” and specifically composers Danny Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans master this feat while constructing unique sounds to their already ominious enveloping. Child whispers, religious hymns, and even character dialogue are used to establish a mix that gives it such a personal touch within the unraveling of the story, and in conjunction with a church organ set at ear-piercing decibels of volume, it creates an air of originality that proves any genre of music can be made creepy if it accompanies the proper imagery. It’s important to note that the film perfects when to use such instrumental pulse, and when to let the scene breathe on its own, and it never feels annoying or intrusive because of such respects. Beyond even that though, it’s the way the musical score preserves the one element between sides that they all share in common, residing over them like a mutual haunting of grief that damn near makes this a ghost movie of the least fantastical kind.

– Homage creativity. There are two movies shown during the same scene, and the way these instances are deposited when compared to what’s taking shape in our current narrative proves the film has a sense of humor and respect for film similarities that came before it. I won’t spoil what they are, but one is easily one of my favorite horror films of all time, and it’s made even more meaninful when you consider it comes at a time in the film where what’s being shown on screen obviously can be accurately interpreted for what’s taking place metaphorically within the world of “The Lodge”. The other one is nothing more than a throwaway sight gag for bad cinema, but does offer one of those few much-needed moments of pleasant breath from the smothering uneasiness that resides so prominently throughout 103 minutes of this picture.

– Heavy themes. For my money, the film is not only a dissection on religious zealotry, but also about the weight of adolescent grief that is made even more apparent through the eyes of untimely loss. In this regard, the two sides of opposing characters in the film are almost mirrored from different age stances, and it’s in their vulnerability where they let religion take the reigns and guide them in their decisions through a series of poorly decoded scripture. This is all taking place during a narrative of divorce, which is already easily accessible for most of the audience who see the film, but the way it’s stitched together with the fragile psychology that I previously mentioned proves that Fiala and Franz have a lot of depth to their cinematic achievements, which include but are certainly not limited to 2015’s “Goodnight Mommy”. The kids in their films clearly juggle lots of adult circumstances, and cement a consistency in scares that relies on the innocent being corrupt with all of life’s untimely happenings.

– Entrancing performances. Riley Keough gives the performance of a lifetime as this tortured woman who is balancing enough weight from her haunting past as she does in the detestable rendering she is given by her peers in the foreground. Through an onion-peeling turn that sees her transform before our very eyes, Keough tiptoes through fantasy and reality of mental instability, and does so with a vulnerability that makes her performances succeptible to the horrors of both with such decaying optimism. In addition to Keough’s star-making turn, the child actors were also both meticulously creepy without feeling over-the-top like modern horror films do with their youths. Their creepiness, especially that of Lieberher, stems from recent loss that he hasn’t had ample time to mentally heal from. There’s a sense of anger and blame that he lays at Keough’s door, and it offers a satisfyingly awkward mental chess game taking place between them that proves some broken down walls are better left in place to shield the burden of scapegoat blame.

– Tropes done right. This film does have one jump scare, as well as three different fake-out dream sequences, but the way they are used and rendered gives them effective meaning with the kind of tonal capacity the film has solidified. For the jump scare, it’s done with the church organ that I previously mentioned, and feels completely earned in a quietly subdued house where anything feels possible behind its hallways of darkness and locked rooms. As for the dream sequences, they aren’t meant to accurately convey reality, and almost from the start of each one the clever editing device, that chops in between images in and out of the scene’s setting, establishes that this is very much neuro-fantastical. In going to the well so often on it, it also conveys Grace’s (Keough) decaying mentality, which struggles with giving in to a past that she wears like the heaviest luggage. If more horror films gave meaning to these instances, instead of using them as continuous cliches within the genre, they could serve a purpose in throwing a fog into the proverbial fire of terrifying that the film has no qualms with keeping lit at all times.

– The architecture. I have never complimented a movie for this, but there’s a first time for everything when something so practical feeds into the thematic stand that much of the film is about. The Lodge itself, where roughly 80% of the movie is set, is dimly-lit, colorfully-obtuse, and atmospherically-cold at duplicating the weather taking place outside its doors. The religious symbolism seen at every turn alludes not only to the family’s dedication to such, but also a constant presence of someone associated with the family’s past, which challenges Keough accessibility towards them. Beyond that main setting, the father’s house at the very beginning of the film supplants a modern architecture scheme, complete with challenging angles and monotonous color, which ideolizes his dependency on material things throughout his life. Finally, the neighboring house to the lodge that is intentionally shaped like a cross is structurally one of the most unique things that I’ve ever seen, and stands as the crossroads for a character who comes into contact with it.

– Film choice. “The Lodge” was shot in 35mm print, and what I find so interesting about this decision is the way a wide angle composition will often distort the length of a long hallway, or depict the entirety of a room where the characters only make up so little of what is being focused on. This decision obviously adds more to the unnerving tension that the movie prescribes on us early on, but beyond that it’s the distortion of reality that takes something that is already creepy enough in its material, but then made even more complimenting when you consider how lonely and isolated it makes every one of its characters in peril feel. It colorfully illustrates another layer of loneliness and lifelessness within the established setting, and completes everything about the unorthodox production that solidifies horror not only be a terrifying experience, but an immersive one as well.

NEGATIVES

– Unnecessarily disorienting. One constant annoyance from my otherwise enjoyment of the film was when this film came down with a case of attention deficit during the moments when certain characters required it the most. What I mean by this is one character will experience something terrifying that shakes them to their core, and then the film will cut away to focus on other characters who are experiencing nothing throughout the house. I can forgive this aspect if the characters taking the attention away play into what is transpiring with the now unforeseen character, but this disturbance supplants a series of unnecessary roadblocks, which take away too much momentum in pivotal pay-off’s during the points when the movie needs it the most to sell to its audience. As a result, the film never truly deviates from the abundancy of quiet moments used to absorb its isolation, which in turn challenges the audience interest in the form of second half pacing that isn’t as strong as the first.

– Braindead decision-making. This is common for horror films typically, but the level of asinine directions made for characters quite frequently broke the immersive experience, and made me groan in what was transpiring. I won’t go through them all, but some of the most nagging circumstances to me involved a father who leaves his children alone with this woman they haven’t met until a day prior, and one who was the lone survivor in a religious cult that simultaneously committed suicide. In addition to this, said father loads her with a gun before he leaves, which is understandable to arm yourself against strangers attacking the house, but not justifiable to a woman with such an agonizing past. The only other one I will mention is how the father doesn’t seem concerned that the phones are cut-off at the lodge for days, and only returns once his work in the city is complete. Did he not try to call them for three whole days? These are a few in a series of logical hiccups that couldn’t subdue my mental reasoning, and only exist to further push the narrative in ways it otherwise couldn’t without them.

My Grade: 8/10 or B+