Woodland

The only good thing in this mess of a movie is its actors. Both Richard Harmon and Philip Granger were solid and believable. The rest is barely watchable, unfortunately. A poorly written script delivers a truly abhorrent lead character that is as interesting as a roach caught in a jar trap: you're annoyed by him and can't wait for him to drop dead; disappointing cinematography fails to capture a beautiful Canadian landscapes; and ludicrous CGI scares away even those who came to terms with all the above. 'Woodland' could be much better that it is. A huge waste of acting skills.

I found this movie fascinating in that it creates and sustains an effective trance like effect. I think that comes mostly from the visuals and music score considering very little happens and there's very little plot or dialog.

If that was the intent, it succeeds quite well.

Went into Woodland with high expectations for a thrilling, nature-inspired mystery, but I was mostly left underwhelmed. While the setting of the deep woods was beautifully shot, with some genuinely atmospheric moments, the film struggled to build any lasting suspense or depth.

The plot moved at a frustratingly slow pace, and I kept waiting for something gripping to happen that never really came. The characters felt underdeveloped, making it hard to connect with their struggles, and the storyline itself was fairly predictable. There were a few twists that tried to keep things interesting, but they felt forced and didn't do much to elevate the plot.

The main redeeming quality here was the cinematography, which captured the eeriness of the forest quite well. Unfortunately, stunning visuals alone couldn't make up for the lackluster plot and one-dimensional characters. If you're looking for an intense thriller or a compelling mystery, Woodland might leave you wanting more.

I don't really know what to say by and large about this movie's plot. It is a very quiet, slow, methodical film, framed in such a way that its supernatural synopsis almost feels like a bait and switch of sorts.

The setup is some photojournalist guy, Jake, in 1989 is going up to Alaska for some reason to a heavily secluded area with just one another guy called "Sparky". Jake takes random photos and when he develops them finds that they contain imagery that wasn't in the scene when he photographed them. Later on he finds that the imagery in the photo ends up appearing on the objects he shot. As in, he seems to be taking photos from the future.

But this plot element is played down so heavily that it could have been completely removed and the film would've been almost exactly the same. It's done so lethargically and without any impact on the story as a whole that it's almost entirely possible that it's not even happening, that he's somehow hallucinating that these photos are from the future somehow. Considering all the flashbacks showing him rolling around flailing in seemingly drug-fueled stupors, he may just be hallucinating as a result of long-term drug abuse.

Ultimately, this gimmick plays no role in what the film is really about, and that which he himself monologues at one point in the film; something's gone wrong with his life and he's essentially taken himself and all his worldly possessions to live and work in a completely abandoned part of Alaska, and we, the audience, and to some degree even he doesn't entirely know why. Or does he?

All of this would be much more compelling indie-movie type fare if the character weren't so insufferably obnoxious, brooding, and seemingly prone to violent outbursts for no clear reason. Instead of being an intense character study of an intense character, it becomes almost the living embodiment of the meme "God has allowed me to live another day and I'm about to make it everyone's problem"

This movie has such beautiful, breathtaking cinematography. The mountain scenery draws you in completely, you feel you are right there. The storytelling in this sense kind of prods you to join in with your own imagination instead of spelling it out for you - I think this is a positive aspect of Canadian made films. For a low budget they were able to pull off to the best of their ability, what they should've, compared to some of the huge budget movies that completely lack substance but spend a lot of money packaging a pile of $%$# to look nice (and which undiscerning types don't seem to care enough to call out). A great first attempt and I'll look forward to more from this team/director as they grow their work.