Brightwood

Going through a rough patch in their marriage, a couple trying to put it behind them with a heated exercise section around a nearby lake in the woods are confronted with the terrifying prospect of being trapped in the area and unable to leave as they're chased by shadowy figures.

This was a generally enjoyable and likable genre effort. Most of this is based on the highly effective and trippy sense of atmosphere built up that border on the nightmarish. The longer the two wanders around the woods running into each other, bumping into each other coming up behind the other unexpectedly, being unable to find their directional bearings, coming across strange beings or objects left in their way, or encountering a series of weird sensory phenomenon, these aspects provide a fantastic nightmare-logic setup. These situations are effectively eerie and unsettling while being unnerving enough to let the action present play out as there's quite a lot of fun to be had once they get to the second half and the scenario gets far wilder and bloodier which makes for some fun to be had here. There are some big factors against this one. Among the biggest issues is the overall repetitive nature of what's going on here as there's not a lot of variation found throughout the film. It's easy to notice that this one falls into a formulaic pattern of the two yelling at each other, encountering something supernatural that prevents them from leaving and continuing the process several times over which shows off the incredibly weak storyline here. Rather than do something with this type of setup of them meeting versions of themselves in alternate timelines, there's nothing here that hasn't been seen in this type of storyline setup before so it's not all that original. These factors are enough to bring this one down somewhat from what it could've been based on its positives.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.

The $14K budgeted movie just gave me a much better time than just about any big budget horror/sci-fi flick I've watched in the last few years. Starts of briefly as a domestic drama before morphing into a bit of thriller, than gets into the horror before revealing the high concept of its plot. Don't want to give anything away, as its best to not know what is coming, but this was brilliantly done, and I'm still thinking about the significance of the ending. The two leads also killed it, as they have to portray quite a few different sides to their characters. Looking forward to whatever Dane Elcar does next.

Does a lot with a basic premise. Two characters, one breaking up with the other with no reason for the audience to like either one of them. Are they all ways like this or do they bring out the worst in each other? How long has their relationship been this bad (seems like a long time). Was it ever healthy between them? They become trapped in a vortex jogging around this small lake. So it's all about tension, the tension between the couple, the tension between them and their situation. For a movie with so much tension from beginning to end it was easy to watch. The acting was great as was the suspense. Highly recommend, but know going in you're going to be watching a dysfunctional couple fighting for most of the movie.

They tried their best. It had potential, it could have been good but man they let it slip by over complicating it.

I enjoyed to an extent. Only two actors, good chemistry between them. Perhaps to much couple arguments to give the impression all was not well in the relationship. First half was fine but I never really got what was going on. Some time travelling, some sci fi, not horror.

They are looking for a path but they are on the trail. No basic knowledge of using the sun to get out of the wood which is basically in suburbia. The wood itself also isn't much, the trees are to young to give the real horror vibe.

Watch if you have nothing else to do but don't expect much.

As loop movies have proliferated, it gets easier to compare them to the best of the genre, and that's a real problem. At least, being a horror movie, this is unlikely to be compared to Groundhog Day.

There's some division about the quality of the acting. I actually enjoyed it. I tend to be more focused on plot over character, but the amount of contempt I felt for Jen was a good sign that both the script and acting were doing a good job. There's also a good amount of nuance going on, as we hear more about their relationship and what Dan is like, you are left to wonder how accurate her perspective is. But regardless of that, it's hard to fault Dan, since he's at least trying to make things work.

The quality of the loop is pretty messy. There are a few locations along the trail, but most of it is interchangeable, which makes everything pretty confusing. This is where the movie takes the big misstep - it's too confusing in the wrong places.

It should be easy for me to place events in a particular location, and with specific copies of the characters. There are too many copies of each character, and there isn't enough to differentiate them. This most likely intentional, but it tends to frustrate viewers if there's no way to understand what you're seeing.

I was very pleased with the ending. In order to bring the characters together, things get very dark. And I'm always happy to see a movie take a risk like this.