The original title "Oak" speaks volumes about this film's script and creators - whose artistic ambitions seem to have petrified like old tree bark. An oak-wooden plot, oak-clunky pacing, oak-stiff acting, oak-dull direction. Even the acorns on this tree are worm-eaten, leaving viewers nothing to chew on but the tough bark of mediocrity - a sluggish, half-baked story where even the central oak metaphor remains as flat as a pressed leaf.
When Armand Assante (easily the most interesting actor here) growls: "Do you feel any love here? Any respect? Neither do I. Then I'm leaving!" - I got chills. Finally, a hint of raw emotion! Maybe this would be a haunting meditation on cruelty and abandonment? But no - after this promising start, the director drowns everything in meaningless chatter, ridiculous character choices, and half-baked folklore until the characters literally turn into trees (both figuratively and... somehow literally?).
Our "oaken" protagonist - some teenage kid - drives five girls to touch a magical oak. They leave at dawn and arrive at... midnight? Did they cross three states? Is this forest 1,000 miles away? Instead of showing their road trip bonding (you know, actual storytelling), the film just jump-cuts from morning to night. Five characters touch the tree; the sixth nopes out and vanishes without explanation.
And those "moody" tree scenes? So over-lit it looks like Christmas decorations - as if the director thinks we're too dumb to notice an oak without spotlights. Later, the script half-heartedly remembers a grieving child subplot... which goes nowhere.
Then someone declares: "Nature is a world of living organisms." Wow, Captain Obvious! What's the message here? "Save the trees"? Are we all turning into oaks? Is this an allegory for climate change? Oh wait - now there's a "petrified nurse" who's apparently... nature's healthcare worker? Sure, why not.
More "magical" editing yanks us between scenes:
A pointless marital argument (immediately forgotten)
Endless walking shots (the director's go-to when he runs out of ideas)
A trash can lid and flashlight becoming "weapons" against the "oak curse" (yes, really)
Assante rambling about clay pots and salvation (while God weeps in heaven)
Zero visual poetry (unless you think blatantly visible light rigs in bushes are art). The tree symbolism? Empty calories for pretentious film bros to overanalyze. The glacial pacing isn't atmospheric - it's just copying better directors. Any eco-message is MIA.
The film rips off Nightmare on Elm Street:
A nursery rhyme ("Tick tock... don't touch the oak...")
Vigilante parents
A dream-reality blur
But our antagonist - Nurse Freddy? - has no menace, no rules, no point. She's just a woman in scrubs given carte blanche to be random.
Watching this feels like being slowly fossilized. Yet somehow... the director won. I hated it, but I can't forget it. If there's ever Oak 2: The Barkening, I'll HAVE to watch. That's cinema's cruel joke!"
