Keeper

Liz (Tatiana Maslany) and her boyfriend Malcolm (Rossif Sutherland) drive to a secluded cabin in the woods to celebrate their one-year anniversary. Almost immediately after their arrival, it becomes clear that they are being watched. In a nearby cabin, Malcolm's cousin Darren (Birkett Turton) is staying with his new girlfriend Minka (Eden Weiss). Liz eats a welcome cake left behind by the concierge, and soon after, strange spirits begin stalking her. When Malcolm has to leave for work in town, Liz is left alone in the cabin with whatever is haunting her.

I have to admit: despite being a slow burn, Keeper is genuinely tense at times. The bathtub scene, where Liz is surrounded by what looks like a flowing wall of spirits, is particularly effective and made me hopeful that this film might become something truly unsettling and original. For a moment, it felt like the movie was building toward something fresh. Unfortunately, that promise doesn't fully pay off.

One of the main issues is how the spirits are used. Most of the time, they linger in the background, visible to the audience but positioned just out of Liz's line of sight. While this can work as a suspense technique, it's overused here. When a spirit finally reveals itself to Liz, it disappears almost immediately, turning what should be a terrifying moment into a cheap jump scare. The film repeatedly hints at danger without committing to it.

The third act raises more questions than it answers. Malcolm eventually offers an explanation for what's happening, but it feels incomplete. Darren suddenly vanishes, with no explanation. The spirits resemble a toned-down, almost softcore version of Hellraiser-style creatures, yet the film never explains why they look this way or what they represent. The ending feels rushed, as if the filmmakers realized they needed to wrap things up quickly and chose the most convenient resolution for Liz without fully earning it.

By the time the credits roll, there are too many loose ends: Who made the cake? Why did it trigger the events? What really happened to the other women? And what exactly were these spirits?

If none of that was meant to matter, then it raises a bigger question: why make this movie at all?

Keeper isn't a bad film. It has atmosphere, tension and a strong central performance from Tatiana Maslany. But it ultimately settles for ambiguity where clarity was needed, leaving the experience more frustrating than haunting.

I will admit, the cinematography is good! But it's pretty framing on a kindergarten level painting. The story is jumbled and feels slightly rushed yet somehow you'll feel every minute going by at the pace of a snail, it feels like he's trying to explain that men will sacrifice anything to reach a goal but it tells it in such a way that feels as if he let an edgy 2015 era Tumblr-ite write the script. I spent a concerning amount of time thinking about other movies I could have seen instead of it while it was playing, not worth the time or energy it took and it ruined my evening. Kinda like "this could've been an email" but in movie form...

Most of my time watching this movie I was thinking "This is not very good at all, this movie doesn't know what it wanted to be".

But then the ending comes and boy is it a wonderful ending. I don't want to spoil anything about the ending so I won't say anything about it other than i loved it and it redeemed the other 90% of the movie.

The Cinematography is the best element that is good throughout the movie and the audio is well and of course as I mentioned above the ending is the best aspect of the movie.

The acting I wasn't really sold on for most of the movie but it worked during the great ending section.

A mixed bag but it was worth watching until the end, I wish more of the movie was like the ending, which was very creepy and super well done.

Get through the movie to see the ending and you will appreciate it. I usually LOVE slow burns in horror flicks, usually my favorite ones are slow burns. But the slow burn in this didn't really work, thankfully the ending saved the movie.

I would have given this movie a 4 out of 10 if the ending wasn't as good as it was. The ending I would give a 9/10 though. So overall since I didn't like most of the movie but LOVED the ending I will give it a 7/10.

In the end it is Osgood's most inconsistent movie but it is also my favorite ending of his to so make of that what you will.

Osgood Perkins third film in 18 months is another horror story, though tonally different from both "Longlegs" and "The Monkey". This is , I suspect, the most divisive of the three films and I'm not sure really benefitted from the improvements made possible by Neon's cash injection.

Liz (Tatiana Maslany) comes to the secluded woodland house belonging to her boyfriend Malcolm (Rossif Sutherland). The only nearby house belongs to Malcolm's cousin Darren (Birkett Turton) though he is supposed to be away. Liz begins to see and feel presences in the house and surround area that she can't explain. Her distrust of Malcolm grows, though he too is seeing his previously sensible and capable girlfriend seemingly losing her mind.

I listened to a podcast with Osgood Perkins before seeing the film, so I am aware that the film was shot before "The Monkey" in Canada, as a way to keep working around the 2023 labour strikes. I also knew that it was shot in a 'pickup' style with them attempting to hammer out exactly what the story was in post-production and also that Neon gave him a small amount of money to enhance the visual effects ahead of release. I don't think that those CGI elements were to the films benefit, the practical effects are much scarier than those elements, particularly as they are exposed for quite long period in the last act.

I was maybe a bit more prepared though for the "dark trip" style of the film, as opposed to some of the rest of the audience in the screening I was in, who seemed more negative about the film at its conclusion than I felt. I thought that Maslany was, as she always is, brilliant.

It couldn't live up to an exceptional trailer and the 'cleanliness' of the CGI elements, as opposed to the physical effects really worked against the film, but overall, I still feel positively about it.

This was his worst movie...not onIy is it bIand and boring, nothing really happens...there was almost zero mystery. Just a cheap story thrown into odd scenes with shadows...this is the same story we have seen over and over, most recently we saw it in WEAPONS...I was expecting it to be nuts like Together or The monkey...instead we just get 1 shocking scene that was SH0WN lN ALL THE PR0M0S...RUlNED.... I reaIIy had high hopes we would get something unique...but nope...we get some cooI cinematography, some good production vaIue...and that's lT...you might as weII check out Shelby Oaks lf you haven't...That M0VlE was 100x better and scarier...